I recommend 2 new modes you can play in, each with their own leaderboards. Each mode as a simple check box in the mission preview/briefing screen.
Ironman - All ships destroyed are permanently lost. No saving!
No Pause - No pausing the mission once unpaused.
Note that there's no reason these need to be mutually exclusive.
Both easy to PRPL.
For the second, it's trivial enough to put here:
once
1 OperateWhilePaused
endonce
IsPaused if
UnpauseGame
endif
Making leaderboard with PRPL is not possible?
Virgil decides if these two can get to game or not. :)
Well, I haven't dug into PRPL, so I'm going to just take your word that these can be done using it.
This line of thought misses the fundamental point though.
The point here is to be able to have leaderboards for different categories which emphasize different skillsets on *all* maps.
This allows players to compete in different styles of play, which will likely require very different strategies. For example, a ship sacrifice would mean a *lot* more in an ironman run and must be weighed very carefully. The approach and tactics that you might use could be very different if you are unable to pause the game to finesse certain things and would emphasize player reaction time.
If you need an analouge in another game, consider classic dooms Compet-N.
Sorry, I became sidetracked.
Interesting concept, but I think it may be left to the mapmaker.