UPDATE 2: OOTP 26 Public Beta Patch: 26.4.61

[SidHickenbottom]

Originally Posted by Lukas Berger

As far as stuff goes, there really is not any significant issue with development here from any of our tests. Like Matt mentions, things can always be tweaked and we'll certainly take another look or two at development in the future.

That being said, what people are seeing as an issue is really just the expected results of some changes and tweaks we've made to more closely track real-life trends. This comes in three parts, I think.

First and most important, is simply the flatter distribution of stuff in modern baseball. Basically, because everyone is throwing so hard now, it's created a situation where there are fewer and fewer pitchers who stand out from the crowd in the ability to get K's at a significantly higher rate than their peers. Everyone tends to cluster very closely around the league average in K rate and K/9, and there are few fewer outliers here than there were even a few years previously.

Second, when you couple that with our moving the 20-80 scale toward a more realistic version of the scale, where the majority of players fall into the middle of the curve, with 40-60 ratings, it means a lot of pitchers end up clustering around league average with their overall ratings.

Third, we've made the change to leave pitching potentials showing to later ages than in previous years, because there are increasingly more players who break out with significant improvements in their late 20's and early 30's. So we want to leave the potential for this to happen in the game, just as it does in reality. It shouldn't be the expectation, as most players do not see this sort of jump, but it is common enough that the possibility should be taken into account.

This is a very helpful explanation, and it corresponds with my lived experience this year. I've been playing for about 17 years now, and my game play experience as someone who prefers small market rebuilds/expansion teams and depends entirely on developing talent to succeed has been radically different and far more challenging. While it has been frustrating, I appreciate the logic behind the change and the challenge of having to play differently, or at least reconsider my preconceived notions about the right way to succeed at OOTP.

[rwd59]

Originally Posted by Lukas Berger

Changing development settings won't change that.

Got to disagree on that. I was getting basically zero development of players until I changed my aging and development speed to the settings Dr. Satan posted that he was using. Now I am having some success. I am talking about all ratings not just stuff ratings. In 20 years of playing I had not had any luck developing players until I changed to his settings. My method of play has for years..... been taking control of the worst team in the league and staying with that team until I win a world series. Then I resign and start over with the worst team again. I don't usually dabble in free agency because the salaries given out are way too high. $30 Mil a year for a relief pitcher who hasn't even been a closer? $50 mil a year for pitchers who are nowhere near being considered a stud? There are way too many of those super paid players. This year there are 5 players at $40 mil per year. My current game has 17 of those players. I don't want to be the Dodgers and out buy everyone else. I want to be the Rays and have to develop my stars then trade them to replenish my farm system when they get super expensive. I wasn't having much luck at that in this version until I changed to DR. Satan's settings. That being said, at least I now have a way to continue playing the way I like to play and have a few players who actually develop.

[rwd59]

Originally Posted by SidHickenbottom

This is a very helpful explanation, and it corresponds with my lived experience this year. I've been playing for about 17 years now, and my game play experience as someone who prefers small market rebuilds/expansion teams and depends entirely on developing talent to succeed has been radically different and far more challenging. While it has been frustrating, I appreciate the logic behind the change and the challenge of having to play differently, or at least reconsider my preconceived notions about the right way to succeed at OOTP.

I agree that it was a helpful explanation. It would have been more helpful if it wasn't over 2 months after the release of the game considering how many people have complained about development issues. Oh well, at least we have the explanation now.

[Francoeurstein]

Originally Posted by rwd59

I agree that it was a helpful explanation. It would have been more helpful if it wasn't over 2 months after the release of the game considering how many people have complained about development issues. Oh well, at least we have the explanation now.

It was a helpful explanation, thank you Lukas. But yes, I agree rwd, this information should have been more widely available.

[Brad K]

Originally Posted by Lukas Berger

That was never really a good thing, and it was kind of deceptive as well, since you run into a situation where if too many guys have too high ratings in a given category, it really means no one has a high rating.

Needs an asterisk.

* When using auto-calc.