Has base game approach to unqualified DEF positions changed?

[FranchiseTimeMachine]

I might be misremembering, but I seem to recall being able to put players anywere on defense in the base game. They would be terrible, but the game would let me proceed with the simulation.

But when I try to do things like an entire roster of pitchers or an entire line-up of versions of Matt Stairs and Todd Zeiles, the base game acts more like PT and won't let players field positions where they have no rating. Or won't recognize a pitching staff of all non-pitchers. This also happened in Ezradenney's stream last night when he tried to play an entire roster of Wille Mays clones.

Is this a change in more recent versions of OOTP?

NOTE: it's entirely possible that I was adding fielding ratings to make my crazy sims possible, but I do NOT recollect having to do that in past versions of the base game (OOTP XX and farther back).

[md40022]

I completely apologize for being off topic here, but as a Cubs fan who got the pleasure of a few seasons of Matt Stairs, we always joked that based on his body type and the overall look that he had to him that we just pictured he played the game in a Hawaiian shirt, shorts and flip flops and he had a cooler full of beer right next to him in the outfield with a cigarette in his mouth...... basically we pictured that he treated MLB games like I'd treat a picnic softball game

So, the idea of an ENTIRE TEAM of Matt Stairs very much put a big smile on my face. Thank you for this.

And again, sorry for being off topic... Hopefully the next person can give you a more productive response.

[uruguru]

I would just like to put lefties in the infield. I've personally played 2B in amateur games and it wasn't nearly that big of an adjustment. I think 3B would actually be more challenging than 2B. It was just great not always playing 1B or OF.

[LansdowneSt]

It may have changed, it may not have changed, but I think if you changed every 0 in experience to a 1 you could do such sims. There may be an issue trying to get lefties to play at 3B and SS but I think due to some historical oddities, C should work for lefties.

[uruguru]

Yeah, if I'm going to the editor I just change them to throw R.

[FranchiseTimeMachine]

Originally Posted by md40022

I completely apologize for being off topic here, but as a Cubs fan who got the pleasure of a few seasons of Matt Stairs, we always joked that based on his body type and the overall look that he had to him that we just pictured he played the game in a Hawaiian shirt, shorts and flip flops and he had a cooler full of beer right next to him in the outfield with a cigarette in his mouth...... basically we pictured that he treated MLB games like I'd treat a picnic softball game

So, the idea of an ENTIRE TEAM of Matt Stairs very much put a big smile on my face. Thank you for this.

And again, sorry for being off topic... Hopefully the next person can give you a more productive response.

No worries about being off topic - great to hear from soneone who got a kick out of the idea. If you want to see what happened, I'm copying all my Twitch VODs to YouTube so you can find that Matt Stairs episode here: https://youtu.be/Qf6WtUMq9qg

[FranchiseTimeMachine]

Originally Posted by LansdowneSt

It may have changed, it may not have changed, but I think if you changed every 0 in experience to a 1 you could do such sims. There may be an issue trying to get lefties to play at 3B and SS but I think due to some historical oddities, C should work for lefties.

This has come up and we were informed that there is a built-in (but hidden) severe penalty for left-handed throwers playing 2B, SS, 3B.

My high school baseball team once played against a left-handed throwing shortstop. Watching him contort his body to make throws to first base was odd, but he was such a good athlete he made it work.

[FranchiseTimeMachine]

Originally Posted by LansdowneSt

It may have changed, it may not have changed, but I think if you changed every 0 in experience to a 1 you could do such sims. There may be an issue trying to get lefties to play at 3B and SS but I think due to some historical oddities, C should work for lefties.

I think that used to be the case as well, that putting in some nominal amount of fielding would get the player onto the field. But I this week in OOTP25 had to crank up OF ratings into the 50s before the base game would accept the player in LF/RF and had to boost OF range to 80+ before any CF rating appeared. Just adding 1 then 10 were the first things I tried - sorry, I should've clarified that in my OP)

THere's no way I fudged with the fielding ratings that much in the past.

If this is, indeed, the only way to get players onto the field, I'll do it, but it severely undermines the penalty for putting players out of position because they're now not really out of position (based on their edited ratings)

[uruguru]

Originally Posted by FranchiseTimeMachine

This has come up and we were informed that there is a built-in (but hidden) severe penalty for left-handed throwers playing 2B, SS, 3B.

Which is actually crazy for 2B. For starters, lefties have a significant advantage turning DPs from 2B.

The pivot throw for 2B comes on balls up the middle but even RH throwers have to contort to make that long throw to 1B. But in general being a lefty at 2B is not too bad because you have more time to make the throw to 1B compared to 3B or SS.

But yeah, I would just change them to throw R in that case.

[Matt Arnold]

In the base game you can always play someone at any position, even if they have no rating there. The AI may not necessarily put them in the lineup when you ask the AI if they have a 0 rating at the position and no potential to gain more, but if you actually simmed out, they would play someone there, however bad they were.

[FranchiseTimeMachine]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

In the base game you can always play someone at any position, even if they have no rating there. The AI may not necessarily put them in the lineup when you ask the AI if they have a 0 rating at the position and no potential to gain more, but if you actually simmed out, they would play someone there, however bad they were.

That's what I thought too, Matt, but it happened to me and it happened to Ezradenney during a stream.

In Ezra's case he couldn't start the sim because the game kept telling him he had no pitching staff even though he had set the positions of 12 non-pitchers to pitcher and populated the pitching staff. So he couldn't get to the point where he could sim it out as you suggested. (NOTE: In that case I was only watching, not driving, but it seemed like he had set things up correctly)

In my case it might've been possible to force a sim with empty line-up spots. I will try that, but I will also eventually run into the pitching staff issue that Ezradenney did.

You can probably still find it on his VOD from the night after Willie Mays passed.