</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by mtw:
<strong>This seems overly hostile. With multiple, time-spaced threads, it seems that this is a feature that is "in demand" by a significant segment of the OOTP4 community and would bear serious consideration.</strong>
Actually there are two active threads on this and only one other and the three or four people asking for the feature end up being shouted out in each one by the three or four people who don't see it as necessary... that would lead me to say that the vast majority of the people here don't care or don't see it as a major issue.
<strong>
Especially when there is the brilliant suggestion of restructuring the unrealistic anti-5+ game winning streak factor as a "home field advantage". Or just eliminating the anti-winning streak factor altogether and not adding any artifical game modifiers would be fine, too (or making such artifical modifiers optional).
</strong> I really haven't seen the "streak" factor have much of an effect in my recently completed season I had multiple 12 game winning streaks by several different clubs. It sounds like you had a streak or two end at five games and of course attributed it to that effect (I'd doubt this was the only thing that killed your streak (which doesn't say it didn't help)... keep in mind the "streak-busting" rating supposedly only impacts the starting pitcher and was supposed to be slight enough not to turn Pedro to Darren Oliver (although scary thing is that might not have been bad in some starts this year <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> ). (BTW, the factor wasn't supposed to come into play until the 6th game, so your definition should probably say 6+ game win streak factor) I still stand by the belief that this is a small enough factor that it wouldn't have been noticed if it hadn't been mentioned in an early review as "a great thing".
</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">In any event most of the ideas of how to adjust for the homefield involve the whole sale editing of ratings by giving players a boost at home and an equal sized decrease on the road, with the idea that the playing time would probably balance out. This is something that I don't see as an acceptable change... Here are some stats:
I took one team (Boston) and used the three year averages (1999-2001) of each pitcher on the squad the results are presented here:
*
3 year splits missing last years stats presented
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">code:</font><hr /><pre style="font-size:x-small; font-family: monospace;">
Name Hm Av Hm ERA Hm IP Rd Av Rd ERA Rd IP
Arrojo .295 5.48 226.2 .243 2.31 190.0
Banks* .000 0.00 4.0 .192 1.35 6.2
Burkett .297 5.30 231.0 .253 3.43 270.0
Castillo .257 4.61 125.0 .227 3.31 149.2
Crawford .288 6.21 29.0 .237 2.50 36.0
Fossum .211 4.01 24.2 .312 5.95 19.2
Garces* .221 3.86 35.0 .217 3.94 32.0
Hermanson .274 3.95 305.2 .277 3.98 301.0
Lowe .254 2.70 146.2 .241 3.09 145.2
Martinez .196 2.16 270.1 .182 1.85 276.2
Oliver .290 5.48 213.2 .303 2.70 244.2
Urbina* .243 3.25 36.0 .217 4.11 30.2
Wakefield .275 4.58 232.0 .248 5.00 236.0
Wallace* .279 4.84 22.1 .192 2.25 28.0</pre><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Before you complain "well Fenway is a hitters park" notice that the pitcher who've spent significant amounts of the time shown not on the Sox (Burkett, Castillo, Hermanson, Oliver, Urbina, Wallace) show no evidence of being better at home either.
You'll also notice some pitchers (Arrojo, Burkett, Castillo, Oliver) do indeed have a big enough split between times pitching at home and times pitching on the road to skew the statistical results.
Then there was this simple comparision:
</font><blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr /><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Originally posted by Peter Bergstrom:
<strong>For what it's worth, Diamond Mind Baseball models Home Field Advantage. <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" /> Face it, men, we need it!</strong></font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">For what? The game produces realistic enough stats, and win loss records? Why introduce an artificial, and potentially results skewing (for individual players) rating for the sake of two fairly insignificant win - loss splits? To me this really isn't necessary.
And even if it was necessary how do you measure and introduce this rating. (Adjusting the pitchers doesn't seem appropriate) Last year Boston, Toronto, Baltimore, Cleveland, Seattle, Anaheim, Atlanta, Houston, Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Los Angeles and San Diego all did better on the road, than they did at home. Does this mean these teams need negative adjustments to their "home field advantage" factor just to offset the gains they showed on the road.
Heck Atlanta made the playoffs without even winning half of their home games, so just how significant is the home field advantage in the major leagues, if you can make the playoffs without winning the majority of their own home games.
In the end all the stats balance out and are fairly good without this artificial factor.
Edit - This reminds me of what my mother used to say: If Diamond Mind Baseball jumped off a bridge would you? <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />
In the end most people will point to a familiarity with the grounds as being the primary cause of the homefiled advantage. This I can understand and about the only homefield advantage modifier I could get behind would be like this:
Look I agree homefield advantage in real life is a factor (not as big a deal as you seem to believe though), however, to weaken the simulation in other respects just to bolster two fairly insignificant statistical values is a cost that isn't worth paying in my opinion. Does it really matter how many games team A won at home?, NO, what matters is how many they won overall.
The only type of homefield advantage that would seem realisitc to add to me is a very small one, and it would be attached to the teams stadium screen. The main home field advantage in MLB is familiarity with the park and its ground rules and the lay of the land. So each stadium could have a small factor (0-9) that reflected how much the home field would benefit the home team in that stadium. The effect of this factor would be a fraction of a percentage add to the chance of a favorable outcome to the home team on close plays. By setting it to 0 for all teams no team would have to deal with it, by setting it to 9 all teams would have the maximum benefit to their home parks, but it would still be a small effect.
This factor would impact the home team favorably only slightly on close plays where familiarity with the field might give them a split second advantage getting to the ball or robbing that homerun.. and it wouldn't effect stats drastically or result in unrealistic home/road stats breakdowns for players.. but this is about the only home field advantage factor I could support in OOTP...
In any event I'd be fine without it.
BTW - I certainly wouldn't complain about losing all the "arbitrary" ratings... I wasn't a huge fan of the clutch rating either, but as long as its a small impact it won't bother me too much either...
<small>[ 05-07-2002, 01:55 PM: Message edited by: ScottVib ]</small>