my massively big and slow but fun world

andyhdz · 07-06-2016, 05:10 PM

Here is my world. Out of the 378 hours that I spent playing it I would say a good 30% of it was just setup, trial and error, crashes, re-starts, graphics setup, stops, re-dos and a few purges but I finally got it to work just the way I like it. I've gotten rid of a most of the excesses that would slow it down so no almanac, baseball cards, and most leagues sim at basic stats.

My world is a mix of real and fiction because while 99% of the teams in it either exist or did exist they are structured in a way that veers from real life.

My main major league is one 16 team Pacific Coast League that has a mix of defunct and current PCL teams and one 16 team MLB which has been renamed Atlantic League Baseball (ALB) comprised of 8 NL and 8 AL teams. All of the teams even the minors are divided up between the Eastern and Western region of the country. The PCL is modeled after the current AL with DHs while all the teams in the ALB don't use the DH ala pre-'73. Naturally they both play in an association and the ALB has a commanding league in the all time series. Both leagues have similar player creation modifiers and finances though. I used to have them trade with each other but that screws up their HOF chances so I eliminated that but players that are free agents are free to go anywhere. I use 3 levels of minors that only draft 20 or 21 year olds and I'll explain that a bit more later.

Then I have an international association made up of the 8 world leagues and 4 independent US and world leagues. My 8 world leagues each have one level of minors and I adhere to the real foreign limits. My indy leagues are made up 4 leagues. One American league has 6 divisions that do not play against each other until the playoffs so that lets me create mini-indy leagues within the main league that I modeled after real indy leagues. It's much easier and efficient to have one 24 team indy league rather than four 6 team leagues. The three other indy leagues are latin american (20 teams), asian (16 teams), and european (8 teams). By using regional limits it allows me to funnel asians to the asian league, latinos to the latin league etc. It works like a charm. I use 8 player foreign limits so they are not completely segregated. The Indys serve to scoop up all the players that aren't in the majors or main international leagues.

I even setup 1 level of minors for the indys which I call second tier indy leagues. This is necessary because I hate the reserve system in the game. The Indy minor leagues compete in a short season.

The top 2 teams from each of the world and indy leagues (minus the Major leagues) compete annually in a 24 team international series that ends just before the world series starts. I have it setup where they first play in regional playoffs (euro indy vs dutch vs italian, mexican vs cuban vs latin indy, American vs Aussie vs Taiwanese, Korean vs Japanese vs Asian indy). The 4 indy league teams serve as fodder and usually don't make it past the second round. In the beginning this series was dominated by the Koreans but lately the Dutch have staked their claim winning 3 out of the last 4 cups.

Finally the machine that keeps all of this going are my 10 feeder leagues. Every single player "born" in my universe starts off as an 18 year old in one of these feeder leagues. I don't have discoveries on and all 18 year olds go through the feeder system. For the Majors this is my 64 team NCAA league and Caribbean league (for Dominicans and Venezuelans) and for the international leagues they have their own academy setup where prospects play 2 or 3 years and come to the league as 20 year olds. This system allows me to effectively have one level of minors for the world leagues and only have 3 levels in the majors eliminating the rookie level. I could write a whole long post on the NCAA setup but I'll skip that.

My season starts in January when the feeders play and they finish around March when the International leagues start. The Majors start in April with the Indys being the last one to start on April 10th. All drafts happen the day before the leagues start.

By then players that don't get drafted or get cut are usually picked up by the Indys. If they are so bad that they can't even be picked up and placed in the 2nd tier Indys then I'll delete them if they are 20 or retire them if they are over 40. I need to do this maintenance to keep the free agent pool from being too big because that's where the slow down happens.

So there it is. I'm in year 17 and have played in the PCL, ALB, and am currently in the mexican leagues for another 5 years or so. Next up I think I'm taking my talents to Australia and maybe then I'll take on an American Indy team before I come home to momma and go back to my Fresno Grizzlies of the PCL. Yes the league is a bit slow sometimes but not to the point where I get frustrated. I love that everything is in one place. With periodic purging I keep my league under 2 gigs. I backup twice a year.

BeanballComin · 07-06-2016, 07:30 PM

Quote:

With periodic purging I keep my league under 2 gigs

Great read / game set-up.
Now that must be one heck of a lot of purging.

BBGiovanni · 07-06-2016, 08:41 PM

Thanks for posting this, I'm in the process of building a megaworld like that and hoping it will work and stay stable (enough).

When you say "with periodic purging", can you explain a bit what you mean? I have been using almanacs (because I'm really simming out to create a world in which to set stories I would like to write) but I'm wondering if maybe I should turn them off. I hadn't thought of pruning the FA list either, but I'll keep an eye on it as I go along.

Oh, I also like the idea of having US indy leagues play in a "world cup" type of thing, a good way to have a balanced international competition alongside MLB.

nebradska · 07-07-2016, 12:13 PM

I'd love to read your post on your NCAA setup.

andyhdz · 07-07-2016, 01:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BBGiovanni

Thanks for posting this, I'm in the process of building a megaworld like that and hoping it will work and stay stable (enough).

When you say "with periodic purging", can you explain a bit what you mean? I have been using almanacs (because I'm really simming out to create a world in which to set stories I would like to write) but I'm wondering if maybe I should turn them off. I hadn't thought of pruning the FA list either, but I'll keep an eye on it as I go along.

Oh, I also like the idea of having US indy leagues play in a "world cup" type of thing, a good way to have a balanced international competition alongside MLB.

Well purging is a database tool that deletes files and players that are no longer used in your universe. It reduces the file size of the league and makes it go much faster. There are cons to this though you run the risk of messing up your league according to the instructions but I find the risk worth it because of the benefits and of course I backup my league before I purge. I only had one purge go wrong and that's because I deleted a bunch of leagues and immediately purged which really screwed things up. I purge about once every 7-8 years. Normally most smaller leagues don't have to purge until 40-50 seasons but I have so many leagues it gets massive pretty quickly.

The almanac takes way too long for me because of the amount of leagues so I dont do that.

Yes the FA list is the culprit to slow sim times more so than the actual number of games you are simming. The association setup is amazing and makes it worth it to build all these leagues knowing they compete with each other at the end of their seasons. It works very well because even if a league finishes early nothing happens (ex: free agents, offseason) until the other leagues in association finish and the playoffs start.

andyhdz · 07-07-2016, 01:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nebradska

I'd love to read your post on your NCAA setup.

sure I'll post one later today

Padreman · 07-07-2016, 01:30 PM

When you purge first of all how do you do that and does it delete player history, stats records?

andyhdz · 07-07-2016, 01:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Padreman

When you purge first of all how do you do that and does it delete player history, stats records?

look at my screen shot that I posted. on the right hand side there is a button called database tools. If you click on it there will be a dropdown for purging.

Purging does not delete player stats or records. It does delete player transactions and player history so you won't see how they came up, when they were drafted or signed or when someone picked them up or released them in their transactions but their stats and team stats and records are not changed. You'll still be able to see all of their stat lines. The other con is that the id is reused so you might see player history that belongs to another but like I said the actual stats and records are not changed. Purging also removes deleted players from the database and some deleted leagues if you did that. You need to backup before you purge and like I said I only had one bad purge in about 7 that I've done.

Padreman · 07-07-2016, 01:56 PM

Thank you very much so if I understand this correctly only there transaction history is the lead? That I don't mind at all what about minor league accomplishments? Does it still safe that?

andyhdz · 07-07-2016, 02:50 PM

Yes all accomplisjments a and awards even minors are still there. I would recommend you purge before the season starts so you don't have to deal with games in progress

Bucky Ball · 07-07-2016, 06:06 PM

Great advice. I'm considering making my setup slightly larger now as a result of this.

07-06-2016, 05:10 PM	#1
andyhdz All Star Starter Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Fresno, CA by way of Texas Posts: 1,754	my massively big and slow but fun world Here is my world. Out of the 378 hours that I spent playing it I would say a good 30% of it was just setup, trial and error, crashes, re-starts, graphics setup, stops, re-dos and a few purges but I finally got it to work just the way I like it. I've gotten rid of a most of the excesses that would slow it down so no almanac, baseball cards, and most leagues sim at basic stats. My world is a mix of real and fiction because while 99% of the teams in it either exist or did exist they are structured in a way that veers from real life. My main major league is one 16 team Pacific Coast League that has a mix of defunct and current PCL teams and one 16 team MLB which has been renamed Atlantic League Baseball (ALB) comprised of 8 NL and 8 AL teams. All of the teams even the minors are divided up between the Eastern and Western region of the country. The PCL is modeled after the current AL with DHs while all the teams in the ALB don't use the DH ala pre-'73. Naturally they both play in an association and the ALB has a commanding league in the all time series. Both leagues have similar player creation modifiers and finances though. I used to have them trade with each other but that screws up their HOF chances so I eliminated that but players that are free agents are free to go anywhere. I use 3 levels of minors that only draft 20 or 21 year olds and I'll explain that a bit more later. Then I have an international association made up of the 8 world leagues and 4 independent US and world leagues. My 8 world leagues each have one level of minors and I adhere to the real foreign limits. My indy leagues are made up 4 leagues. One American league has 6 divisions that do not play against each other until the playoffs so that lets me create mini-indy leagues within the main league that I modeled after real indy leagues. It's much easier and efficient to have one 24 team indy league rather than four 6 team leagues. The three other indy leagues are latin american (20 teams), asian (16 teams), and european (8 teams). By using regional limits it allows me to funnel asians to the asian league, latinos to the latin league etc. It works like a charm. I use 8 player foreign limits so they are not completely segregated. The Indys serve to scoop up all the players that aren't in the majors or main international leagues. I even setup 1 level of minors for the indys which I call second tier indy leagues. This is necessary because I hate the reserve system in the game. The Indy minor leagues compete in a short season. The top 2 teams from each of the world and indy leagues (minus the Major leagues) compete annually in a 24 team international series that ends just before the world series starts. I have it setup where they first play in regional playoffs (euro indy vs dutch vs italian, mexican vs cuban vs latin indy, American vs Aussie vs Taiwanese, Korean vs Japanese vs Asian indy). The 4 indy league teams serve as fodder and usually don't make it past the second round. In the beginning this series was dominated by the Koreans but lately the Dutch have staked their claim winning 3 out of the last 4 cups. Finally the machine that keeps all of this going are my 10 feeder leagues. Every single player "born" in my universe starts off as an 18 year old in one of these feeder leagues. I don't have discoveries on and all 18 year olds go through the feeder system. For the Majors this is my 64 team NCAA league and Caribbean league (for Dominicans and Venezuelans) and for the international leagues they have their own academy setup where prospects play 2 or 3 years and come to the league as 20 year olds. This system allows me to effectively have one level of minors for the world leagues and only have 3 levels in the majors eliminating the rookie level. I could write a whole long post on the NCAA setup but I'll skip that. My season starts in January when the feeders play and they finish around March when the International leagues start. The Majors start in April with the Indys being the last one to start on April 10th. All drafts happen the day before the leagues start. By then players that don't get drafted or get cut are usually picked up by the Indys. If they are so bad that they can't even be picked up and placed in the 2nd tier Indys then I'll delete them if they are 20 or retire them if they are over 40. I need to do this maintenance to keep the free agent pool from being too big because that's where the slow down happens. So there it is. I'm in year 17 and have played in the PCL, ALB, and am currently in the mexican leagues for another 5 years or so. Next up I think I'm taking my talents to Australia and maybe then I'll take on an American Indy team before I come home to momma and go back to my Fresno Grizzlies of the PCL. Yes the league is a bit slow sometimes but not to the point where I get frustrated. I love that everything is in one place. With periodic purging I keep my league under 2 gigs. I backup twice a year. Attached Images Last edited by andyhdz; 07-06-2016 at 05:22 PM.

07-06-2016, 08:41 PM	#3
BBGiovanni All Star Starter Join Date: Aug 2015 Location: Republic of California Posts: 1,911	Thanks for posting this, I'm in the process of building a megaworld like that and hoping it will work and stay stable (enough). When you say "with periodic purging", can you explain a bit what you mean? I have been using almanacs (because I'm really simming out to create a world in which to set stories I would like to write) but I'm wondering if maybe I should turn them off. I hadn't thought of pruning the FA list either, but I'll keep an eye on it as I go along. Oh, I also like the idea of having US indy leagues play in a "world cup" type of thing, a good way to have a balanced international competition alongside MLB. Last edited by BBGiovanni; 07-06-2016 at 08:51 PM.

07-07-2016, 01:30 PM	#7
Padreman Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2013 Location: Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico (formally San Diego, CA.) Posts: 4,131	When you purge first of all how do you do that and does it delete player history, stats records? __________________ Chargers= Despicable Traitors

07-07-2016, 01:56 PM	#9
Padreman Hall Of Famer Join Date: May 2013 Location: Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico (formally San Diego, CA.) Posts: 4,131	Thank you very much so if I understand this correctly only there transaction history is the lead? That I don't mind at all what about minor league accomplishments? Does it still safe that? __________________ Chargers= Despicable Traitors

07-07-2016, 02:50 PM	#10
andyhdz All Star Starter Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Fresno, CA by way of Texas Posts: 1,754	Yes all accomplisjments a and awards even minors are still there. I would recommend you purge before the season starts so you don't have to deal with games in progress Last edited by andyhdz; 07-07-2016 at 02:53 PM.

07-07-2016, 12:13 PM	#4
nebradska Minors (Triple A) Join Date: Apr 2012 Location: Illinois Posts: 229	I'd love to read your post on your NCAA setup.

07-07-2016, 06:06 PM	#11
Bucky Ball Minors (Rookie Ball) Join Date: Mar 2016 Location: Ontario, Canada Posts: 33	Great advice. I'm considering making my setup slightly larger now as a result of this.