Beatless data

No video comparisons for now, but I tried several different things and tried my best to optimize all movement and menuing for each comparison, as well as seeking out the fastest method of doing things like grabbing M-Tanks and boss fights.

-Cost of Beat letters: 7.85-8.28 seconds
Star: 37 frames
Gravity: negligable (couldn't produce meaningful frame variance from skipping the letter)
Gyro: 56 frames
Crystal: 0 frames
Napalm: 58 frames (42 with alcove drop in Beat route)
Stone: 316 frames (killing both sliders in Beatless)
Charge: 30 frames (20 if you slidejump for the letter in Beat route)
Wave: 0 frames

-Savings from Crystal Warp: 13.38 seconds
*This can vary based on the respawn timer, which I didn't account into this measurement when I made it. There's a setup that reduces the respawn time and there may be a way to get an additional 256 frames, which would bring this total up to around 20 seconds.
-Total Savings in 8 Robots: ~21 seconds

-Cost of Stone M-Tank: 579 frames (9.65 seconds)
stay on buster - 1939 frames
switch to arrow and back - 1915 frames
standard (no m-tank grab) - 1336 frames
*I came up with some really interesting strats for grabbing the M-Tank, but it's a moot point as it's slower than Dark 2's.

-Cost of Dark 2 M-Tank: 394 frames (6.56 seconds)
*Description: climb up the right side, kill the shield with a charge buster, swap to rush jet and quickly hop off it to grab the tank. Fall down the ladder and back-dboost the spine. Climb the ladder and kill the left shield with 2 lemons, foregoing the jet jump up the tall ladder, and doing a ledge jump from it instead.

-Dark 2 Beat vs. Buster: 2.52 seconds difference (factoring in M-Tank refill)
-Dark 2 Beat vs. Crystal: 2.98 seconds difference (factoring in M-Tank refill)

-Dark 4 Beat vs. Buster: 1 second difference (factoring in M-Tank refill)
*theoretical perfect coverage buster fight vs. very good beat coverage + corner kill. Actual times may vary by a few seconds more based on boss pattern.

-Total possible savings from Beatless (before capsule): 11.3 seconds + time gained from 1 less menu input (several places). Up to 12?

I didn't measure any Dark 3 M-Tankless strats because it seems pretty clear they wouldn't be faster than the 6.5 seconds it takes to get the Dark 2 M-Tank. It could be an interesting data point, but I got burned out calculating a bunch of other stuff and don't feel like doing it right now.

Each missed capsule cycle costs around 7 seconds, making Beatless start to lose time to the Beat route after 2 of them, if everything else went perfectly.