"Purely Cosmetic" Players

pholmer · 01-17-2026, 03:50 PM

Although I've been playing OOTP for 15 years, I only started creating my own games (lgs.) with OOTP 25. I am working on an OOTP 26 game and have been trying to import rosters from other games, only to be frustrated by the game's inability to successfully import any rosters.
I opened a roster (text file) and noticed the following notation.
"NOTE: Player and team names are purely cosmetic and will not be used when importing rosters from this file!" (See below.)
What?! What is the point of that? I am trying to create a fictional game with historical players. It would seem to make it impossible to use any previous roster. Am I supposed to import the entire league, one player at a time?
Also, OOTP wants you to import only the rosters created and exported in the game. If you have no players, what do you have to import? (See below.)
Does anyone have a suggestion?

Rain King · 01-17-2026, 04:32 PM

That import will only work for players that have been previously exported from the same league file. It matches things completely based on the internal OOTP player ID.

OOTP does not have functionality for exporting rosters from one save and importing them into another save. That has never been possible.

If you are working specifically with historical players there is a different place (the Free Agent screen) where you can import them from the Historical database into any save. This includes the ability to put them onto a team in your Save (using the Team abbreviation).

I posted screenshots for this area recently in this thread.

https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=366825

Carplos · 01-20-2026, 01:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rain King

OOTP does not have functionality for exporting rosters from one save and importing them into another save. That has never been possible]

I mean, it's technically possible if you lineup the player IDs.

Rain King · 01-20-2026, 02:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Carplos

I mean, it's technically possible if you lineup the player IDs.

Sure, but that is a significant amount of work and not what the feature is designed to do.

(Also, is everything included in the import/export process? Personality Ratings, Biographical Data, etc.? I honestly am not sure, but would bet that there is some stuff missing and the players would keep their "initial" ratings and not of the player being "imported")

pholmer · 01-21-2026, 08:01 PM

What's the point of preventing a roster created for one game (lg.) in another? Why can't each player be allowed to decide that for themselves? Yes, screwups could occur, but I think most players would recognize that they were to blame for incompatibilities that might happen. I'm sure OOTP could be programmed to adjust player IDs, etc., automatically and to ask the user sort out any conflicts. ("Which Rube Foster did you want to add to this team?")

Example: I tried to create a new game recently with a unique league structure. When I clicked the 'Create Game' button, I noticed that MLB was listed as a source league, in addition to my new league. When my new game tried to initialize, it froze. I went back, recreated the new game, deleted MLB as a source, and it worked.

I think allowing player-created rosters, datapaths, stadiums, logos, etc., to be easily imported into additional games would make OOTP more user-friendly, which it should be. What's the point of making it difficult? We're not talking about nuclear codes or DNA genomes here. Creating a game takes a lot of time and effort, so why not make it easier?

Rain King · 01-21-2026, 08:08 PM

I imagine it is less "trying to prevent" and more just "haven't devoted the resources to implement".

This type of request comes up occasionally, but not particularly often. Allowing users to create new data is a bit riskier (and requires a good amount of error handling, also) than just editing the data that is there.

pholmer · 01-21-2026, 11:10 PM

Rain King, I agree with you. I wasn't suggesting anyone was intentionally trying to make things more difficult, but that the end result for the user has the same effect.

However, your response raised another question. When you and Carplos refer to "lining up the player IDs", what specifically are you refering to? I have spent a lot of time trying to do that without success. If I were to open a csv file into a spreadsheet format, what would I be looking for?

Carplos · 01-21-2026, 11:46 PM

Quote:

Rain King, I agree with you. I wasn't suggesting anyone was intentionally trying to make things more difficult, but that the end result for the user has the same effect.

Adding mods to OOTP isn't particularly difficult, and even easier if you use Steam and the workshop.

It only becomes difficult when you want to do things that are much more niche than adding logos, jerseys, etc.

Not everything is for everyone, though.

Quote:

, your response raised another question. When you and Carplos refer to "lining up the player IDs", what specifically are you refering to? I have spent a lot of time trying to do that without success. If I were to open a csv file into a spreadsheet format, what would I be looking for?

There's a player ID column in the export. That has to match a player ID in the league you're importing it to. If there is a player with ID number 327 in the export, but you import it into a league where nobody has 327, that data won't get imported.

So if you really wanted to move players to a completely different save, you'd have to take the player IDs from the league you want to import to and change the ones in the export.

That could obviously get messy if the leagues have different amount of players, etc. It's further complicated because players and coaches/owners are part of the same string of IDs.

Like Rain King said, the export/import isn't really designed for moving players between leagues, and I don't think the devs should really be concerned about it. But you could make it work if you really wanted to. It'd be easiest at the beginning of a save since IDs would start from 1, and it'd be easier to manipulate the IDs of a league. But it'd still take some trial/error.

pholmer · Today, 04:43 AM

I thought that was probably what you meant, but I wanted to be sure. Do the players have to be listed in the same order, or is having the same ID number sufficient?
Why doesn't each player have a fixed ID number? It sounds like that might allow rosters to be reused in other games. Are new player ID numbers generated every time a game is created?

01-17-2026, 03:50 PM	#1
pholmer Minors (Double A) Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Riverside, CA Posts: 188	"Purely Cosmetic" Players Although I've been playing OOTP for 15 years, I only started creating my own games (lgs.) with OOTP 25. I am working on an OOTP 26 game and have been trying to import rosters from other games, only to be frustrated by the game's inability to successfully import any rosters. I opened a roster (text file) and noticed the following notation. "NOTE: Player and team names are purely cosmetic and will not be used when importing rosters from this file!" (See below.) What?! What is the point of that? I am trying to create a fictional game with historical players. It would seem to make it impossible to use any previous roster. Am I supposed to import the entire league, one player at a time? Also, OOTP wants you to import only the rosters created and exported in the game. If you have no players, what do you have to import? (See below.) Does anyone have a suggestion? Attached Images

01-21-2026, 08:01 PM	#5
pholmer Minors (Double A) Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Riverside, CA Posts: 188	What's the point? What's the point of preventing a roster created for one game (lg.) in another? Why can't each player be allowed to decide that for themselves? Yes, screwups could occur, but I think most players would recognize that they were to blame for incompatibilities that might happen. I'm sure OOTP could be programmed to adjust player IDs, etc., automatically and to ask the user sort out any conflicts. ("Which Rube Foster did you want to add to this team?") Example: I tried to create a new game recently with a unique league structure. When I clicked the 'Create Game' button, I noticed that MLB was listed as a source league, in addition to my new league. When my new game tried to initialize, it froze. I went back, recreated the new game, deleted MLB as a source, and it worked. I think allowing player-created rosters, datapaths, stadiums, logos, etc., to be easily imported into additional games would make OOTP more user-friendly, which it should be. What's the point of making it difficult? We're not talking about nuclear codes or DNA genomes here. Creating a game takes a lot of time and effort, so why not make it easier? Last edited by pholmer; 01-21-2026 at 08:02 PM.

01-21-2026, 11:10 PM	#7
pholmer Minors (Double A) Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Riverside, CA Posts: 188	User Friendliness Rain King, I agree with you. I wasn't suggesting anyone was intentionally trying to make things more difficult, but that the end result for the user has the same effect. However, your response raised another question. When you and Carplos refer to "lining up the player IDs", what specifically are you refering to? I have spent a lot of time trying to do that without success. If I were to open a csv file into a spreadsheet format, what would I be looking for?

01-17-2026, 04:32 PM	#2
Rain King Hall Of Famer Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 3,158	That import will only work for players that have been previously exported from the same league file. It matches things completely based on the internal OOTP player ID. OOTP does not have functionality for exporting rosters from one save and importing them into another save. That has never been possible. If you are working specifically with historical players there is a different place (the Free Agent screen) where you can import them from the Historical database into any save. This includes the ability to put them onto a team in your Save (using the Team abbreviation). I posted screenshots for this area recently in this thread. https://forums.ootpdevelopments.com/...d.php?t=366825

01-21-2026, 08:08 PM	#6
Rain King Hall Of Famer Join Date: Nov 2005 Posts: 3,158	I imagine it is less "trying to prevent" and more just "haven't devoted the resources to implement". This type of request comes up occasionally, but not particularly often. Allowing users to create new data is a bit riskier (and requires a good amount of error handling, also) than just editing the data that is there.

Today, 04:43 AM	#9
pholmer Minors (Double A) Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: Riverside, CA Posts: 188	I thought that was probably what you meant, but I wanted to be sure. Do the players have to be listed in the same order, or is having the same ID number sufficient? Why doesn't each player have a fixed ID number? It sounds like that might allow rosters to be reused in other games. Are new player ID numbers generated every time a game is created?