Earl Weaver-like in-game choices

[ctorg]

I've mentioned this in threads before, but I'll mention it here.

Earl Weaver Baseball was a game that came out in 1987 and started my interest in the statistical side of baseball. Its in-game play, despite being dated, had a better way of letting you choose strategy than OOTP.

Basically, after each play, two popup menus came up (one for each team). Using the popup menus, you could go down a list of plays and give each one a red or green light (turning off or on each play respectively). The advantage here was that you could have a variety of types of plays going. For instance, you could play the infield in and have the third baseman charge while the first baseman holds the runner. You could have a runner take off for a steal but let the hitter swing away. You could have a runner on first take off to draw the throw and let a runner on third break for home.

I really think that OOTP could benefit from a similar system. Imagine having a list like this:

Sac Bunt
Bunt for hit
Take
Swing for the fences
Hit a flyball
Hit a groundball
Swing Away
Give runner on first green light
Tell runner on first to go no matter what
Tell runner on first to go on contact (repeat these for other bases)
Run aggressively
Run conservatively

There could be more. You could turn each one on or off individually (though some are mutually exclusive), allowing for a huge number of combinations of plays, way deeper than OOTP is now.

[draven085]

I think these would be a great addition but some of them would require OOTP to move to an accurate pitch-by-pitch simulation engine.

[Dan Theman]

Earl Weaver was wonderful for some things (like being the first to include a true physics model for the graphics). The manager options were very simple and useful. Like Draven said, some would require the game to go pitch-by-pitch (which it isn't built for) but the rest would be wonderful additions.

- Dan

[Ender]

If I remember correctly EW did use the one-pitch mode.

The 2 things I miss are 1) the physics based graphics that made the pbp more exciting and 2) the ability to shift the fielders in, out, left, far left, right, and/or far right by using the arrow keys.

[adventureran]

Originally Posted by ctorg

I've mentioned this in threads before, but I'll mention it here.

Earl Weaver Baseball was a game that came out in 1987 and started my interest in the statistical side of baseball. Its in-game play, despite being dated, had a better way of letting you choose strategy than OOTP.

Basically, after each play, two popup menus came up (one for each team). Using the popup menus, you could go down a list of plays and give each one a red or green light (turning off or on each play respectively). The advantage here was that you could have a variety of types of plays going. For instance, you could play the infield in and have the third baseman charge while the first baseman holds the runner. You could have a runner take off for a steal but let the hitter swing away. You could have a runner on first take off to draw the throw and let a runner on third break for home.

I really think that OOTP could benefit from a similar system. Imagine having a list like this:

Sac Bunt
Bunt for hit
Take
Swing for the fences
Hit a flyball
Hit a groundball
Swing Away
Give runner on first green light
Tell runner on first to go no matter what
Tell runner on first to go on contact (repeat these for other bases)
Run aggressively
Run conservatively

There could be more. You could turn each one on or off individually (though some are mutually exclusive), allowing for a huge number of combinations of plays, way deeper than OOTP is now.

AMEN!

[Dan Theman]

Originally Posted by Ender

If I remember correctly EW did use the one-pitch mode.

The 2 things I miss are 1) the physics based graphics that made the pbp more exciting and 2) the ability to shift the fielders in, out, left, far left, right, and/or far right by using the arrow keys.

EW did have a one-pitch mode that could be selected, but each individual pitch was calculated and then it showed you the "action pitch" to get the results of the play. Unfortunately, OOTP doesn't have an engine to do that with. The graphics, however, do have a possiblity of being implemented at some point.

I loved Earl Weaver, too - btw, we have some of the original beta testers for EW located on this board. Take a peek around and you may bump into one of them, someday

[ctorg]

Originally Posted by Dan Theman

EW did have a one-pitch mode that could be selected, but each individual pitch was calculated and then it showed you the "action pitch" to get the results of the play. Unfortunately, OOTP doesn't have an engine to do that with. The graphics, however, do have a possiblity of being implemented at some point.

I loved Earl Weaver, too - btw, we have some of the original beta testers for EW located on this board. Take a peek around and you may bump into one of them, someday

The original beta testers? Wow, that's cool.

Yeah, I am hoping that OOTP does eventually become a pitch-by-pitch game. It's my opinion that the next big area of focus for OOTP should be what goes on in the game, making play outcomes more accurate and giving a greater variety of managerial options. If and when it does become pitch-by-pitch, I'm hoping it has a one pitch option like Earl did.

I think that, while there are still some kinks to work out, the macro level of the game is at the point where it looks great, and the work that needs to be done now is on the micro level.