cheating the system?

[Samueltbaum]

I just started my first league. Used PP to fill my team with 70-79 valued players. I looked around the league and see that a team had many 90+, and almost whole team is above 80. an above 80 player costs over 1000 PP, we start with 3000, at least I did.

Is this possible for a team that is just starting out?

Things may have changed but I remember if you won your league you get promoted to a stronger league, and if you did bad in new league you got sent back down.

Are there players who do this? Demolish weak competition to win packs, get promoted, change team so that only bad players play, get sent back down and repeat cycle?

[Hwilensky]

maybe..or they could have been lucky and pulled a good card in their starter packs and sold it. I pulled a Madison bumgarner in mine, and sold him for close to 300,000. Which funded the building up of my team...

[Kushiel]

Many if not most of the teams in your league have been playing much of the year. They have settled at that level for several possible reasons.

[LeeD]

A lot of things are possible this late in the cycle. What is the quality of the other team's Diamond players? If the roster is full of early Diamonds then the team won't be very good. Check the underlying ratings. Here's a for-instance on two 92-rated center fielders:

Happy Felsch, in addition to being one of the Eight Men Out, was part of this year's initial card release. He has a defensive rating of 84 and range of 86. Contact is 85, power is 75, eye is 47. Avoid K is 68.

Lars Nootbaar was part of the much-more-recent PT Elite series. He has a defensive rating of 95 and range of 93. Contact is 108, power is 74, eye is 115. Avoid K is 93.

They're both 92 overall, but Nootbaar has the much better card. We've reached the point in this year's cycle where recently-released diamonds are better than a lot of early Perfects...

but it's always best to check the underlying ratings. Those determine the card's actual quality. I could create a team full of Golds and a few Silvers that's significantly better than the worst all-Diamond roster.

[Ty Cobb]

There are sometimes guys who do that. They get caught, and they're out.

Far more likely is drawing a valuable card-selling-for-a-ton or putting in some $$ for points and buying their way into crushing folk.

[Samueltbaum]

Thank you for response! Responding to all.

1. Maybe they got lucky sold a amazing card and bought a bunch of weaker cards. Is there a way to see a Managers previous seasons?

2. Players might have been playing for a year, I would assume inactive though. This again, is just the rookie league, so most of the players on all of the best teams are below 70 value, except for the monster with most 80+, and me 75-79 (simply buying players for 100-200pp). Is the stone level that much stronger of a league that a monster team in rookie is one of the worst in Stone? With a team that good it doesn't seem rookie league is a settle league for them without making it happen.

3.14 of the players are above 90, and all of them are crushing it. Team is 1st in Runs, HRs, ERA, 3rd in BA. I think the quality of their cards are exceptional for rookie league.

4. How do they get caught? Is there a way for us to review an opposing teams manager previous seasons?

Thanks again for the responses!

[rburgh]

Buy as many live cards as you can. In addition to completing the Live missions and getting historical cards as rewards, you will be working on the PT Elite missions, which are a pathway to some terrific cards. You probably should sell off all the toppers, you will need the PP's in the future for the PT Elite missions.



I would work on the AL West teams first, since if you get all (or almost all) of their live cards you will get perfect Freddie Freeman, Corbin Carroll, and Juan Soto and 96 rated starter Logan Webb, and terrific defensive CF Brenton Doyle. And then for another paltry 200K or so you will be able to buy a useful perfect like Ha Seong Kim or Evan Phillips, and then you will be gifted a great multiposition Mookie Betts card.


Then go after the NL East, which is your path to Matt Olson, Trea Turner, Luis Arraez, Kodai Senga, and CJ Abrams, as well as, eventually, Spencer Strider. The AL East will get you Gleyber Torres, Bo Bichette, Triston Casas, Zach Eflin, Kyle Bradish, and eventually Shane McClanahan.


There are also essentially free packs for buying the Bronze build-a-lineiup cards - go to the card shop and search for build Don't bother to do the missions for the higher tier cards, just take your free packs. Other cheap packs are available for strange reasons. When you buy MLB Live Rafael Devers you get a collection of useful historical cards, including a 94 Rafael Furcal and a historical version of Devers that's much better than his live card. And you can get a Gold Tim Wakefield for buying practically any live Red Sox card, even Devers.


They also run many tournaments restricted to live cards (but beware of the Live+ card set, that includes all the PT Elite cards too.)

[Samueltbaum]

Thank you for this. I completely forgot about missions. I remember Missions were how I stacked my deck in 21 version.

[Fabtron7]

Everyone also seems to be forgetting the most obvious of all answers... Someone threw in a few bucks and bought some points/packs/cards whatever.

[Fabtron7]

Originally Posted by Ty Cobb

Far more likely is drawing a valuable card-selling-for-a-ton or putting in some $$ for points and buying their way into crushing folk.

I missed this... nailed it.

[Ty Cobb]

You don't generally miss much, Fab. I kind of feel sneaky now for saying it that way...

[Samueltbaum]

Thank You

[Bunktown Ballers]

I

Originally Posted by samueltbaum

i just started my first league. Used pp to fill my team with 70-79 valued players. I looked around the league and see that a team had many 90+, and almost whole team is above 80. An above 80 player costs over 1000 pp, we start with 3000, at least i did.

Is this possible for a team that is just starting out?

Things may have changed but i remember if you won your league you get promoted to a stronger league, and if you did bad in new league you got sent back down.


This post just says what i been saying all year. Silver leagues should be silver cards and under only, gold leagues gold cards and under only. Diamond leagues diamond cards and under only. Perfect leagues perfect cards and under.
Doing that would increase the prices to get the better cards of said league. Silver, gold, diamond cards prices would generally go from current prices up bc the better cards would be wanted. Those cards would sell high because a player wouldn't be contending against whales in silver leagues
.
Are there players who do this? Demolish weak competition to win packs, get promoted, change team so that only bad players play, get sent back down and repeat cycle?

[rburgh]

Are there players who do this? Demolish weak competition to win packs, get promoted, change team so that only bad players play, get sent back down and repeat cycle?

There are. But the game company cracks down hard on people who do this.


But mostly, there are people who play this game extremely well. It's just like chess - I appreciate the artistry of the top players, but I could never hope to compete with them. I played against Viktor Korchnoi once, when he gave a simul in Pittsburgh. There were about 30 people who paid for the privilege of losing to him; I was one of the first ones out.

[Ty Cobb]

Originally Posted by Samueltbaum

Are there players who do this? Demolish weak competition to win packs, get promoted, change team so that only bad players play, get sent back down and repeat cycle?

are there players who do this, but there are not enough people at the company to oversee it IMHO. All through the cycle of PT, search the Universe, sorting by missions, tournament wins, winning %. Look for irregularities and ask the question, "Is this even realistically possible?" If they aren't reported, they often fly under the radar for some time.

You want it to stop? Start helping to police it. Reports ARE taken seriously.

[Samueltbaum]

Originally Posted by rburgh

There are. But the game company cracks down hard on people who do this.

But mostly, there are people who play this game extremely well. It's just like chess - I appreciate the artistry of the top players, but I could never hope to compete with them. I played against Viktor Korchnoi once, when he gave a simul in Pittsburgh. There were about 30 people who paid for the privilege of losing to him; I was one of the first ones out.

That pretty cool you were able to play him... I enjoy chess, but don't have drive to be a top tier player.. On chess.com I hover in the 85-92 percentile, depending on how much time I spend practicing and relearning the skills I lost by not playing. My chess phase typically lasts maybe a month, then I focus back on other adventures...

[Samueltbaum]

I suppose my main question.... Is would doing this be that wrong? Its an effective way to get a bunch of PP quick.

I simply didn't know if it was considered cheating the system/frowned upon if one chose to do it.

Thanks for all of the responses!

[bailey]

Originally Posted by Samueltbaum

I suppose my main question.... Is would doing this be that wrong? Its an effective way to get a bunch of PP quick.

I simply didn't know if it was considered cheating the system/frowned upon if one chose to do it.

Thanks for all of the responses!

None of these teams ever do anything with the points. They always stay in rookie, so who cares about them? (and they don't get banned even when reported).

You can earn thousands of packs just watching streamers and figure each pack is worth 1000 points on the average. That's over 3000 packs in a year and 3 million points. You can win thousands more packs in quick tournaments leading to millions more points.

If you want to be like the cheaters, go ahead, no one will stop you.

[Samueltbaum]

Originally Posted by bailey

None of these teams ever do anything with the points. They always stay in rookie, so who cares about them? (and they don't get banned even when reported).

You can earn thousands of packs just watching streamers and figure each pack is worth 1000 points on the average. That's over 3000 packs in a year and 3 million points. You can win thousands more packs in quick tournaments leading to millions more points.

If you want to be like the cheaters, go ahead, no one will stop you.

Now I haven't done the drop back a level since it seems to be an unspoken rule and upsetting to some.

This said I personally think paying to play and streamer codes are worse than going back and forth between leagues. At least going back and forth between the leagues is someone that takes the time in game, to improve what they have, and not going outside the game perimeters of the game to win.

Michael Jordan didn't become one of the greatest because he spent a bunch of money, or somehow got a code by spending a minute a day logging into a stream to get a code to improve his skills. He played, and played. Sometimes he played against the best, sometimes he took a step back and played against lesser competition to test things out to enhance his skills. But he stuck to the game itself.

Just playing devils advocate here....

Now in the eyes of OOTP its not against the rules to do either. It is encouraged, but from a competitive standpoint for the game it becomes less about the skill of the game, and more about who has the most money, or who watches a streamer (I'm sure there are some people who have their friends tell them the code, or simply look the code up online from someone who posted it).

Now that all said, I'm not saying either of those are wrong or that the game needs to change. OOTP has a great thing going on. But the thought that someone is called a cheater taking the time to go between leagues to help them gain their packs, to enhancer their team to move up to higher rankings, is interesting to me, when a bunch of people gain their packs without needed to spend that much time in the game itself seems head scratching.

I'm not trying to call any of them cheaters, just more of a response to your last response. Its all just a game, the way I see it none of the three I stated is breaking the rules (cheating), since there is nothing that stops it from happening.

[Samueltbaum]

Originally Posted by Samueltbaum

Now I haven't done the drop back a level since it seems to be an unspoken rule and upsetting to some.

This said I personally think paying to play and streamer codes are worse than going back and forth between leagues. At least going back and forth between the leagues is someone that takes the time in game, to improve what they have, and not going outside the game perimeters of the game to win.

Michael Jordan didn't become one of the greatest because he spent a bunch of money, or somehow got a code by spending a minute a day logging into a stream to get a code to improve his skills. He played, and played. Sometimes he played against the best, sometimes he took a step back and played against lesser competition to test things out to enhance his skills. But he stuck to the game itself.

Just playing devils advocate here....

Now in the eyes of OOTP its not against the rules to do either. It is encouraged, but from a competitive standpoint for the game it becomes less about the skill of the game, and more about who has the most money, or who watches a streamer (I'm sure there are some people who have their friends tell them the code, or simply look the code up online from someone who posted it).

Now that all said, I'm not saying either of those are wrong or that the game needs to change. OOTP has a great thing going on. But the thought that someone is called a cheater taking the time to go between leagues to help them gain their packs, to enhancer their team to move up to higher rankings, is interesting to me, when a bunch of people gain their packs without needed to spend that much time in the game itself seems head scratching.

I'm not trying to call any of them cheaters, just more of a response to your last response. Its all just a game, the way I see it none of the three I stated is breaking the rules (cheating), since there is nothing that stops it from happening.

Maybe a better analogy..... An mlb prospect batting .250 gets sent back down to triple A to improve his skills.

That player is not in the bottom % of players in the league, they are also not elite enough to be considered an one of the best. But this AAA player with batting .350/.440/.550 in, only bats .250/350/.450 in MLB.

In relation to OOTP that team is cheating by sending that player back down to AAA because he is too strong to be in AAA, but not strong enough yet to succeed in MLB. So that players growth is hindered because the competition is too strong for them.

Now on the flip side an ALL star being sent to rookie ball, simply to win a rookie ball championship would seem to be a waste of that All stars talents, and could hurt the rookie ballers growth.