How Much Work Does Scouting Add?

fhomess · 08-13-2010, 01:12 PM

One of the things that has always been a stumbling block for me joining an online league is if that league uses scouts. It seems to me that scouting adds a significant additional amount of work to the GM's responsibilities. I also have always had the impression that the results of the process were frustrating because scouting views were divergent enough to give you basically no idea which view to go on. I'm aware that these impressions were based on scouting as used in the game a few versions ago, and as I understand it, the whole process is better now. So I'm looking for opinions on both sides of the equation.

Why do you like/dislike scouts in your online league?
For those using scouts, how much time do you spend per sim on scouting?
Are there times of the year (draft, trade deadline, etc) where you invest more time on it?
Is there a competitive advantage to spending a lot more time on it?
How do you reconcile different scouting reports on the same player?

I'm particularly curious to hear from people in multiple leagues with different scouting settings.

Thanks!

WillieMaysHayes · 09-14-2010, 11:29 PM

Thanks for posting this...I am really debating whether or not to use scouts in a league I'm trying to set up as well...

I do have one gripe that's easily fixed....When you turn on scouting for any league, the CPU automatically assigns scouts to each team....and since it's incredibly easy to resign a scout, there is no presence of a free market really for great scouts to get what they are worth. I've seen great scouts go for $5M in some leagues because someone messed up and didn't re-sign their guy back (if they had resigned him they probably could have gotten them at 350k per year or something stupid).....I've seen commissioners edit each scout after turning them on and creating an initial free agency period for them - I think that's the way to go if you want to turn on the scout option.

The one thing I am VERY interested in - the level of scout's effectiveness...I know there is a setting in the rules where you can have scouts Highly Effective and you can also have them as Low......I'm interested in how that setting changes scouting in leagues.

08-13-2010, 01:12 PM	#1
fhomess Hall Of Famer Join Date: Nov 2002 Posts: 3,637	How Much Work Does Scouting Add? One of the things that has always been a stumbling block for me joining an online league is if that league uses scouts. It seems to me that scouting adds a significant additional amount of work to the GM's responsibilities. I also have always had the impression that the results of the process were frustrating because scouting views were divergent enough to give you basically no idea which view to go on. I'm aware that these impressions were based on scouting as used in the game a few versions ago, and as I understand it, the whole process is better now. So I'm looking for opinions on both sides of the equation. Why do you like/dislike scouts in your online league? For those using scouts, how much time do you spend per sim on scouting? Are there times of the year (draft, trade deadline, etc) where you invest more time on it? Is there a competitive advantage to spending a lot more time on it? How do you reconcile different scouting reports on the same player? I'm particularly curious to hear from people in multiple leagues with different scouting settings. Thanks! __________________ StatsLab- PHP/MySQL based utilities for Online Leagues Baseball Cards - Full list of known templates and documentation on card development.

09-14-2010, 11:29 PM	#2
WillieMaysHayes Minors (Double A) Join Date: Jul 2010 Location: Denver, CO Posts: 143	Thanks for posting this...I am really debating whether or not to use scouts in a league I'm trying to set up as well... I do have one gripe that's easily fixed....When you turn on scouting for any league, the CPU automatically assigns scouts to each team....and since it's incredibly easy to resign a scout, there is no presence of a free market really for great scouts to get what they are worth. I've seen great scouts go for $5M in some leagues because someone messed up and didn't re-sign their guy back (if they had resigned him they probably could have gotten them at 350k per year or something stupid).....I've seen commissioners edit each scout after turning them on and creating an initial free agency period for them - I think that's the way to go if you want to turn on the scout option. The one thing I am VERY interested in - the level of scout's effectiveness...I know there is a setting in the rules where you can have scouts Highly Effective and you can also have them as Low......I'm interested in how that setting changes scouting in leagues.