57 wins in a row...

[Ty Cobb]

and only a 3k reward.

I'm remind of a scene from Animal House...

[professor ape]

Originally Posted by Ty Cobb

and only a 3k reward.

I'm remind of a scene from Animal House...

Congrats on the streak. It has to be tricky for the team to set the rewards. If you make the rewards for streaks like this too high then you further encourage teams to tank so they can play in lower levels. That being said, 3K feels really low for a streak of that length.

[Ty Cobb]

Well, it was a team I started last week from Android. For a short time, == I == was a whale. No $$$, just some fortunate draws. Back to the grind now.

[ncap99]

Really no reason to reward a win streak this long. The only time it will ever happen is when you're severely outclassing the competition, and like previously mentioned would just encourage tanking.

[ubernoob]

Originally Posted by ncap99

Really no reason to reward a win streak this long. The only time it will ever happen is when you're severely outclassing the competition, and like previously mentioned would just encourage tanking.

Almost as if they should put every league together randomly instead of having it promotion/relegation based (outside of putting your teams on the same license in a league together.)

It would go a long way towards stopping every team from feeling the same.

I could actually use a team full of cards I like as opposed to playing the meta because this is a video game that you have to play the meta cards in.

I don't really care if some years I'd get put with 29 "whales playing the meta" if on the flip side there are years where there are 30 unique 1B, 30 unique 2B, 30 unique 3B, etc.

[Hertston]

Originally Posted by ncap99

Really no reason to reward a win streak this long. The only time it will ever happen is when you're severely outclassing the competition, and like previously mentioned would just encourage tanking.

This. Sorry. While PT is admittedly a bastard subset of OOTP proper, it is still supposed to be a reasonably good simulation of baseball. That just wouldn't happen except in the circumstances stated.

[Bunktown Ballers]

Originally Posted by Ty Cobb

and only a 3k reward.

I'm remind of a scene from Animal House...

I'd be ashamed of myself if I won 57 games in a row. I sure wouldn't post it in FORUMS. Are you sure you didn't sink the Edmund Fitzgerald?

[neugey]

When I see "57 games in a row", it reminds me of Steel Panther's "17 Girls In a Row", which is just about as far-fetched to believe!

[ncap99]

Originally Posted by ubernoob

Almost as if they should put every league together randomly instead of having it promotion/relegation based (outside of putting your teams on the same license in a league together.)

It would go a long way towards stopping every team from feeling the same.

I could actually use a team full of cards I like as opposed to playing the meta because this is a video game that you have to play the meta cards in.

I don't really care if some years I'd get put with 29 "whales playing the meta" if on the flip side there are years where there are 30 unique 1B, 30 unique 2B, 30 unique 3B, etc.

Yeah, I can definitely agree it is sort of frustrating to see all the teams even at diamond level about 90% of the same players with a little variance around some hard to get cards like Keeler, Boggs, McGraw, Noodles, Reuss, etc. I guess the counter argument would be then "skill" at least in terms of PT is a bigger factor than lucky pack rips or a big bank account.

I hope they really put some effort into PT in the coming years as it is way more interesting to me than the base game. Human competition is always going to be better and more exciting, the pack ripping checks the dopamine box and the missions trigger the completionist in me. I think the best suggestion I've seen yet is adding coaching staff cards into the mix. Maybe you run a manager and hitting coach that really emphasis contact and all of a sudden some of those high 80s contact sluggers hit above the mendoza line and become usable. Something like that anyway, where a couple settings enable a ton more cards to be potentially usable.

[Ty Cobb]

Well, it was a first week out of the Entry Pool team that had some fortunate draws. Yeah, I caught some lucky breaks and I cashed them out in a big way. The same team is ironically struggling to generate points in Stone with zero changes. It's funny really. I figured they'd decimate their league as is—they aren't.

[Hertston]

Originally Posted by ncap99

Yeah, I can definitely agree it is sort of frustrating to see all the teams even at diamond level about 90% of the same players with a little variance around some hard to get cards like Keeler, Boggs, McGraw, Noodles, Reuss, etc. I guess the counter argument would be then "skill" at least in terms of PT is a bigger factor than lucky pack rips or a big bank account.

The biggest cause of this 'problem' (inverted commas as it is by deliberate design) is the way the historical perfect cards introduced at the start of the game have been systematically outclassed by the cards that have been introduced subsequently, as mission rewards and otherwise. Which are then outclassed in turn by the next mission drop. The prices of these went into rapid decline and then freefall as their relative effectiveness fell... and took a lot of the possible variety with them as by diamond few, if any, are still playable.

I'm now getting pretty sick of it TBH, after the FH2 mission drops in particular. A couple of years ago you could build a team of favorite players and at least try and manage them into a competitive team. Now it's just a perpetual chase down longer and longer mission chains for the next round of cards amounting to no more than a different name, the same boring pictures (put some bloody effort in, OOTP) and uber-stats. If it wasn't for the anti-tanking stuff, I'd be tempted to auto-sell everything not locked, buy myself an 'MLB Live most Impressive facial hair' theme team and go live in the basement. Come to think of it, I wouldn't even need to buy them.

[dpl1]

Originally Posted by Hertston

A couple of years ago you could build a team of favorite players and at least try and manage them into a competitive team. Now it's just a perpetual chase down longer and longer mission chains for the next round of cards....

I've always thought of being competitive and building a theme team or a team of favorites as completely different things. And what I thought was a nice feature of promotion/relegation is that if you build a theme team and it's competitive at gold, then you're competitive - you don't have to play those identical teams in Diamond (of which I am one). I enjoy both - so I've got my main team which I am trying to get into Perfect, and a theme team that will be sitting around bronze perpetually.

[ncap99]

Originally Posted by Hertston

The biggest cause of this 'problem' (inverted commas as it is by deliberate design) is the way the historical perfect cards introduced at the start of the game have been systematically outclassed by the cards that have been introduced subsequently, as mission rewards and otherwise. Which are then outclassed in turn by the next mission drop.

A very fair point. I think we all have an understanding this game exists to make money, and introducing a constant stream of chase cards is needed to do that. That being said, to introduce a new chase card you have to make it worth chasing, and to do that you need to make it better than the cards that came before it. I think that needs to be balanced with adding variety and choice to team building that requires many cards at every position being viable options. I am not in PL this week but I'd be willing to guess even with the latest monstrous card drop last Thursday, 80% of rosters are pretty much the same. I do not think that is a good thing.

I'll add that one of the worst feelings is to rip a pack, see a 100 historical and realize its complete trash unless it is included in some mission later down the road. It is just a way to further push the chase cards like Dickey or Noodles - further water the pool down so the chances of getting them if you win the dice roll on a perfect player and the second dice roll on it being historical is still only about 1 out of 20 that the card is actually useful. I feel like every historical 100 should at least be playable at diamond level, and the fact is that very few of them actually are.

[professor ape]

I feel like the balance has been pretty solid this year. I’m F2P and have completed 24 of the 30 FH2 missions along with the Negro Leagues. My roster is a pretty good mix rewards from throughout the missions. Cy Young and Slaughter have remained solid at the Diamond level as have Raines and other BaL players. Jackie and Oscar are important pieces and then the rest are mostly FH1 & FH2 cards.

[Hertston]

Originally Posted by ncap99

I'll add that one of the worst feelings is to rip a pack, see a 100 historical and realize its complete trash unless it is included in some mission later down the road. It is just a way to further push the chase cards like Dickey or Noodles - further water the pool down so the chances of getting them if you win the dice roll on a perfect player and the second dice roll on it being historical is still only about 1 out of 20 that the card is actually useful. I feel like every historical 100 should at least be playable at diamond level, and the fact is that very few of them actually are.

Exactly! I was initially ecstatic at what remains by far my most successful card drop when one ten-pack tourney win yielded two historic perfects. However, a few minutes was enough to leave me griping that a couple of good diamonds would actually have been a much better result. I accept that chase cards need to be better in order for people to chase them, but surely the two classes ought to at least be vaguely in the same ball-park?

[AdequateRandomGaming]

Originally Posted by Hertston

Exactly! I was initially ecstatic at what remains by far my most successful card drop when one ten-pack tourney win yielded two historic perfects. However, a few minutes was enough to leave me griping that a couple of good diamonds would actually have been a much better result. I accept that chase cards need to be better in order for people to chase them, but surely the two classes ought to at least be vaguely in the same ball-park?

Too many good cards too quickly. That's definitely part of the issue here. I think that whenever you have a system where some of the highest tier of card becomes obsolete (save for the quicksell price) only a few months into the game cycle, you ought to wonder if the pace is right. Nobody should feel cheated by a perfect historical in August.

[professor ape]

I think they are getting the pacing right because about half of the complaints I see are that content is released too quickly and half feel it is too slow.

[ncap99]

Part of the issue with the chase cards is they all are essentially the same thing - high contact/high avoid K platoon guys who play defense or lefty starters. I posted this in another thread but the complete devaluation of power in this game after they understood it was a problem last year is frustrating. 30 HRs is enough to lead the league most diamond+ seasons. If 80 contact 120 power guys were legit options, they wouldn't have to add cards or change any pacing at all - you'd have options. But right now we're funneled down into such a specific archetype of card to be competitive that it pretty much removes any flexibility and therefor reduces the useful card pool down to only 2-3 guys at each spot at best.

[professor ape]

Agreed that they need to figure out how to give power hitters (and pitchers) a boost. Movement and AvoidK seem to be dominating the leagues right now.