27 if it wasn't the "final" tournament

[zoran]

A lot of decisions for 27 were influenced by it being believed to be the final tournament at the time due to poor ratings and financial issues in monster 9. For example the nerfed stage 1, 3 and probably 4. Competitor's motivations were also impacted by this looming ending.  How different do you think tournament would be if this wasn't the case? We'll say 25 and 26 have better ratings and a high racking TBS executive who is a big fan of the show bails out Monster 9 and solves their financial problems.

I think stage 1 and 2 would have been the same, maybe stage 1's time limit would be a bit shorter. On stage 3, the opening combo would have remained and the flying bar would have stayed as the final obstacle. The third obstacle would either be cycle road, chain seesaw or some other obstacle.  The swing circle would have stayed the same, perhaps a new obstacle would be added between or replacing the bungee ropes.

Stage 4 would have been different, it's clear they used the rope climb to bring back old nostalgia and to almost guarantee a kanzen to wrap things up. I think based on this image from 25 - 
 the original idea for the tower would have been a rope climb first followed by an obstacle whether this be a salmon ladder or something else. If they did intend for the rope climb to be the final obstacle, then it would have been like 28 a full 23m climb starting from a sitting position perhaps with a 35s time limit.

In terms of competitor results, I think Kanno would have withdrawn after his injury from the spin bridge, Nagano could potentially time out on stage 2 (although he still would be motivated by his father's memory), Yuuji and Ryo would likely both fail the 5 rung flying bar or Yuuji at best would have failed the true final stage. A lot of competitors who cleared in the nick of time like Wakky would probably time out. Yamada would be less pissed by his fail or would fail the jumping spider due to less motivation.

[dakohosu]

Here's my take:

Stage 1 will be mostly the same but without the nerfs to existing obstacles. The Escargot will remain the same as in 26 post-modification that tournament (as initially was too hard), Jumping Spider will be the same as 26. Half Pipe Attack could still be the same abomination as we got in 27 with the hard landing, because it was harder than 26. Time limit I could see being 115-120 seconds.

Stage 2 will remain the same, with the 90 second time limit as we did get a couple of 20+ second clears in 26.

Stage 3 will remain the same as in 26 with the exception of possibly the Cycle Road as no one failed it. I doubt they'd bring back the Floating Boards as this was considered to be too difficult and no one passed the Ultimate in 26 anyway, but I'm unsure what they'd replace it with. My best guess would honestly be Chain See-Saw, my two cents being that it was initially conceived to replace the CR but when they wanted a Kanzen they moved it after the Ultimate. 

Stage 4 I think would honestly just be a rope climb, I heard rumours (I'll check again) that this was the intention, but obviously with the full 23 metre tower as was seen in the tournament. Unsure what the time limit would be, possibly still 40 seconds, 35 if they want to be really mean. Given that RISING's Final was still the Spider Climb + Rope I'm unconvinced they'd do the Salmon Ladder that early.

10-15 clears on Stage 1, and 5-8 on Stage 2. Unsure who exactly, but I could see at least Hashimoto, Yuuji, Okuyama, Campbell, and McGrath making it to Stage 3, while Morikami, Kaneko, Ishikawa, and a few of the Americans still making Stage 2. A lot of the rookies with slower times would obviously time out on Stage 1, then even those with faster times could be stopped by the increased difficulty, I also feel that competitors like Ryo and Nagano are at risk of failing as they did fail 26's Stage 1. 

Out of those I mentioned reaching Stage 3, I reckon Hashimoto would either fail the Chain See-Saw if that's the third obstacle, the Ultimate Cliffhanger again, or the Flying Bar. Okuyama and McGrath would fail UCH, Yuuji I see beating the UCH and either failing the Flying Bar or making the Final. I still see Yuuji being able to beat the Final if the TL was 40 seconds, maybe not if 35.