OOTP 17 - Interface discussion

[mtopham]

Originally Posted by Imperialism32

I really miss being able to use backspace to go back to the previous page.

This for sure!!

Also (not about interface, but still important):

- Have the option to show player ID# so it can be exported in the various player searches.

- Make the manager/GM feature and rainouts optional for on-line leagues

Originally Posted by USF

#2:
There is a bug in the lineup screen window where you fill a lineup spot and it automatically changes the position of another player in your lineup. If you are not careful this will create a lineup bug for your games. So lets say I am filling the spot of the Catcher, my RF all of the sudden changes to a different position and my Catcher shows "-" in the lineup. I have to go back and switch my RF back to RF and my Catcher from "-" to C. This happens all the time vs. RHP, vs. LHP. This issue never showed up before until OOTP16.

This one is extremely annoying, especially if you are managing multiple levels of minors as well...

[texasmame]

Originally Posted by RchW

The AI does not warm up pitchers.

Which reminds me, when your starter is hurt and pulled in the middle of an inning or batter, does inserting a guy from the bullpen cold matter or does the computer consider him warmed up due to the injury to the starting pitcher?

[Gomoto]

Add option for much larger fonts (4k display resolution).

[mickey7]

I like most everything about the interface, but I would appreciate if some additional room could be found to increase the size of the photos of the players. I don't remember which OOTP it was ( I've had every one starting with the original) but there was a time when the display of the players was larger. I thought it contributed to the immersion factor quite a bit.

[StickguyMB]

I would like more skin options and more options for the background colors and stuff.

[David Watts]

Originally Posted by StickguyMB

I would like more skin options and more options for the background colors and stuff.

Along those same lines, I would love the ability to change the play by play background color. I always end up using the dark skin, even though it's my least favorite, because the black background with white play by play lettering is so much easier on the eyes. The flash from black to white background with the other 2 skins can have a strobe like effect.

Questdog's skin was by far the best skin for 16, but once the new "leader" feature was added, I didn't like the black boxes. I think there was a way to fix but it was beyond this users smarts to implement.

[David Watts]

Please please please, make it so loading the MLB, All in One quickstart doesn't screw with the Hall of Fame plaques. Finally got a player elected to the hall in random debut league and he has a baseball card instead of a plaque. I know the All in One is a mod, but let's face it, 99.9999% of us download it.

[redranger]

When viewing batters stats in the area where they show stats against pitchers it would be nice to be able to sort by at bats, hits, Etc instead of having to view the list of pitchers alphabetically. Also would be nice on the pitchers card to see same results as to how the pitcher has done against batters (sortable the same way of course)

[redranger]

I would like to see more of a meaningful conversation or result of a conversation when visiting the mound

[Barmy Fungy-Phipps]

I would very much like to see OOTP move away from just one screen to using windows or tabs. I have two examples in mind.

One is baseball websites in a browser - Fangraphs or Baseball-reference, to use the websites I frequent, give me loads of information on the screen, but if I want to see more, I can just right click and open a new tab or window. I can resize the windows and look at them next to each other, or flip back and forth through the tabs. I can open something in a tab, do other tasks, and come back to that tab when I need to see the information. An interface that more closely mimics the browser experience would be very pleasing and much easier to use.

The second is Baseball Mogul - I've been very sad to see a game I loved for a long time slowly wind its way into irrelevance. There's obviously a huge gap in simulation quality between it and OOTP. But the interface has always been MUCH more intuitive and user friendly in Baseball Mogul. The main advantage is using pop out windows for player cards, lineups, and almost anything involving detailed information. The roster page with easily customizable stats and sorting options was also much easier to use than the OOTP equivalent.

Secondary to using windows and tabs would be the ability to customize the information I see. I'd prefer to be able to select stats visible on main screens. This is less important in player pages, more so in lineup screens, and team pages and the like. Being able to pick exactly which stats I want to see would be a big improvement. The customized dashboard Fangraphs offers would be an excellent example.

Since I am mentioning cool features from websites, Baseball-reference has a lot of nice visual tricks to give me easy information. Listing career records by team underneath the career stats, for example. Clicking one year and then another in a player's career to give me a pop-up that sums the stats between those years is another good one. Their whole play index is fantastic, although I would imagine that level of database searching would be difficult to use.

[BKL]

I would like to see the team record showing in the League Scores page, where you see the WP, HR, and Player of the Game, and scoreline for all the league games. This would be helpful because you could quickly assess how that day's game affected the team's records in relation to other teams in the league.

[BKL]

It would also be nice to see a report showing all the trades and free-agent pick-ups and losses for the current season in the report section, as well as stats for those players.

I know we get an offseason summary during offseason, but it would be nice to see a report so that you can quickly look at a team and see what changes were made, even during the regular season. This way, if a team is doing well or poorly, you can assess if it was from pickups or losses during the year. This would be different than a transaction report, because it would just be divided simply into departures and arrivals, how acquired, and stats for current season.

[Kasabian]

A few suggestions I've thought of recently:

1) Hiring of coaching staff -- unless there's a feature I've been missing, it's really awkward looking for coaches right now. There's no way to see who's interested in a job. So often most of the available personnel won't even consider your the available position.

This has left me randomly right clicking, hitting 'offer contract' until someone says they'll do the job then I'll hit cancel, go look at their traits and consider them.

I think in real life it is a combination of a club making it known the position is available and having applications as well as the current system of team's reaching out to potential candidates. [that's my assumption, but sometimes who knows with MLB stuff...].

2) A way to view your team's stats by position. As in combining the stats that players created while in a certain position. For example, in 2015, the DH position gave you .280/.350/.550 -- again could be in the game and I don't know about it.

3) True dual screen compatibility with different game pages open on each screen.

4) While this year made some improvements, if you play as GM only, I'd to see more interaction between the GM and manager.

For example, as GM, you might get a guy you want to lead but the AI manager won't use him that way and won't take your suggestions.

Realistically, a GM might run things by a manager before the guy is acquired. So even if the manager doesn't want to use a guy how you'd like, you'd know have an idea. It's awkward right now just hope your manager uses him in the way you want.

6) [now completely off the interface topic and more of a general suggestion for the future] This actually kind of leads to the idea that I think it would be cool to have more interactions with everyone, from coaches to players. Right now it often seems like you're the only person in the organization.

And while the player GM should have the ultimate decision, it would be nice to have more places to ask for opinions. It's there in someways like during the draft or setting lineups, but it'd be cool if it was expanded to give a more 'committee' feel.

7) Keyboard shortcuts that don't disappear/change between savefiles.

/endnovel

[jpeters1734]

Originally Posted by Kasabian

A few suggestions I've thought of recently:

1) Hiring of coaching staff -- unless there's a feature I've been missing, it's really awkward looking for coaches right now. There's no way to see who's interested in a job. So often most of the available personnel won't even consider your the available position.

This has left me randomly right clicking, hitting 'offer contract' until someone says they'll do the job then I'll hit cancel, go look at their traits and consider them.

I think in real life it is a combination of a club making it known the position is available and having applications as well as the current system of team's reaching out to potential candidates. [that's my assumption, but sometimes who knows with MLB stuff...].

2) A way to view your team's stats by position. As in combining the stats that players created while in a certain position. For example, in 2015, the DH position gave you .280/.350/.550 -- again could be in the game and I don't know about it.

3) True dual screen compatibility with different game pages open on each screen.

4) While this year made some improvements, if you play as GM only, I'd to see more interaction between the GM and manager.

For example, as GM, you might get a guy you want to lead but the AI manager won't use him that way and won't take your suggestions.

Realistically, a GM might run things by a manager before the guy is acquired. So even if the manager doesn't want to use a guy how you'd like, you'd know have an idea. It's awkward right now just hope your manager uses him in the way you want.

6) [now completely off the interface topic and more of a general suggestion for the future] This actually kind of leads to the idea that I think it would be cool to have more interactions with everyone, from coaches to players. Right now it often seems like you're the only person in the organization.

And while the player GM should have the ultimate decision, it would be nice to have more places to ask for opinions. It's there in someways like during the draft or setting lineups, but it'd be cool if it was expanded to give a more 'committee' feel.

7) Keyboard shortcuts that don't disappear/change between savefiles.

/endnovel

I love suggestion number one. It would be nice to set a level and position and see who was interested

[Sharkn20]

When re-playing online games, to show player's year stats when at bat or pitching.

[mac2298]

As a new player, I think just a simpler interface experience would be great. Maybe cut down on all the bells and whistles... or at least have an option to do so (a "newbie" mode?). Something that's cleaner and more intuitive, maybe closer to the Mobile experience, would be great for those who want to play casually.

[Varjak]

When it comes to shopping a player, it would be nice to be able to state a preference for return (I think that was mentioned before) or shop bundles, such as a top prospect with an overpaid veteran. The oft-mentioned ability to reorder columns is also something I'd like to see.

On a non-interface note, this is minor, but on the schedule screen I'd like it to list if the game went extra innings, like the calendar at the top does. I like to check out extra-long games--I can't be the only one who thinks that any game that goes past 15 innings in automatically interesting, if only to see which middle infielder gets saddled with the loss. (Does this game ever pitch non-pitchers in those games? I've never seen it but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.)

[sansterre]

I know this is never going to happen, but I would punch a baby seal if it could.

When I'm playing stats-only, the lack of the graphical bars for the attributes is kind of an eyesore. It means that when playing stats-only you have a graphical suggestion that you aren't playing the game as intended, because right in the middle of the screen there's an empty hole where normally there would be an intuitive visual reference to define the player. So basically good design for the regular games because almost a punishment for stats-only.

How hard would it be to change those attributes bars to stat bars?

Instead of a contact rating it could be a bar graph representing 1B/AB (over the last three seasons, weighted toward most recent) and with the bar sizes corresponding to the appropriate contact. So 17.3% 1B/AB is about what you'd expect for an 11 contact (1-20) so a 17.3% 1B/AB shows up as a graph the size of an 11 contact.

Gap would be (2B+3B*2)/AB, represented the same way.

Power is HR / AB

Eye is BB / PA

Avoid Ks is K/AB

It would give you a sexy quick-reference visual for your players, but would not violate any of the rules of stats-only.

The payoff would be subtle, but I'd appreciate it all the same.

[jpeters1734]

Originally Posted by sansterre

I know this is never going to happen, but I would punch a baby seal if it could.

When I'm playing stats-only, the lack of the graphical bars for the attributes is kind of an eyesore. It means that when playing stats-only you have a graphical suggestion that you aren't playing the game as intended, because right in the middle of the screen there's an empty hole where normally there would be an intuitive visual reference to define the player. So basically good design for the regular games because almost a punishment for stats-only.

How hard would it be to change those attributes bars to stat bars?

Instead of a contact rating it could be a bar graph representing 1B/AB (over the last three seasons, weighted toward most recent) and with the bar sizes corresponding to the appropriate contact. So 17.3% 1B/AB is about what you'd expect for an 11 contact (1-20) so a 17.3% 1B/AB shows up as a graph the size of an 11 contact.

Gap would be (2B+3B*2)/AB, represented the same way.

Power is HR / AB

Eye is BB / PA

Avoid Ks is K/AB

It would give you a sexy quick-reference visual for your players, but would not violate any of the rules of stats-only.

The payoff would be subtle, but I'd appreciate it all the same.

That's a really good suggestion and probably the main reason i don't play stats only. Though instead of stats in that space, I'd rather have the scouting report.

Actually, why not just make the profile page fully customizable like the gm home page?

[sansterre]

Originally Posted by jpeters1734

Actually, why not just make the profile page fully customizable like the gm home page?

What he said