New Historical League Setup Questions

Jupiter · 07-18-2014, 11:23 AM

I have been playing OOTP for years, but I have only run a historical league once. I've decided to try another to play with OOTP 15 before I transfer my primary league from 14 to 15, so I was just fooling around and my first attempt did not go at all as I planned. So I apologize in advance if some of these questions are very basic, but I am hoping that this is a good spot to ask for advice. If you think the thread is better posted somewhere else, please let me know.

I have some specific questions below, but it might be helpful to first explain the overall goal off my league. I would like to create a league that starts at some point in the past (I chose 1940 for my test, but I may start earlier) and, when it has finally run through modern day, includes all real life historical players but has them all playing with the basic strategies and essentially the overall stats of a single time period in history. So essentially I pick a year (1985 in my test, but it could by another year) and choose the overall stat level and strategy settings (5 man rotation, closers, 15 position/10 pitcher rosters, etc.) and then have the historical players enter the league and play in the appropriate years but using those strategies and and tending toward those stats. With the ultimate goal of being able to much better compare the players across time periods once history has played out. I also want to implement the amateur draft and free agency so that all teams are on a more or less equal footing (financials notwithstanding, which I will have to tweak some), rather than having players automatically join their real life team or follow real historical transactions.

I suppose this could just be impossible, but I suspect it is much more likely that my first test was just poorly designed.

Which is fine... that's why it was a test. But I've disappointed myself somewhat in that even though I now know what didn't work, I don't quite see how to fix it.

1) The first issue I have is probably easy. I set up the amateur draft and all new players are entering the draft appropriately. But they all come in at their debut age and are major-league ready. The last time I tried something like this, I was pretty sure I found a way to have players enter the league when they signed their first contract, so that they came in with lower overall skills and were drafted and played in the minors for a few years. I can not find this option currently. It's not a deal breaker, but it annoys me that I managed it years ago and can not do it now and I don't want to get dumber as I age! Do I need to download a separate database to do this?

2) The second issue is potentially more complicated. In order to get players from all eras to play under the same strategies, I was imagining a set of player ratings that were effectively "normalized", so that the average contact rating (or home runs or avoid power or stuff or any other rating) was essentially the same in any era, probably somewhere around 10 on a 20 point scale, the best would always be 20/20, and then the statistical distribution of the other ratings from best to worst was equalized as well. If I could then lock down the overriding statistical modifiers of the league, then all eras would play to the same totals, regardless of the year. Players from 1940 would come in with their own strengths and weaknesses relative to each other, but at the end of a season, the best contact hitter would strike out 30-50 times and the worst would strike out 150-175 times, regardless of what year they played in or what their original true stats were.

When I actually ran it, though, the players imported with ratings that seemed to match their era more so that their talent relative to each other. When I played through 1940-1942 and looked the Avoid K ratings of all batters, the lowest player in the major leagues was 7/20 and the median for the entire league was 16. So it seems like their initial ratings are much more reflective of their era and stats then I had anticipated.

I suspect I could do some editing of the players in the database and do the normalization myself, but I am wondering if this has already been done or if I am just missing a setting in the player import that will fix it.

My ultimate goal is to get a set of ratings such that the best home run hitter from the deadball era or the best home run hitter from the steroid era would both come in with a home run potential of 20/20 and both would hit 45-55 home runs in their respective prime years, assuming everything goes right. Rather it seems the case that the average potential for the deadball era would be much lower than 10 and the average for the steroid era higher than 10.

As a follow up to this, I will say that playing with the statistical modifiers over a number of tests, I seem to be able to force the game to tend toward the 1985 totals for home runs, stolen bases, strikeouts, etc, even with 1940s players. I still have much tweaking to do to get all the stats coming in at the levels I want, but it at least seems possible to get to the right numbers even if the original player ratings are not what I anticipated, so that is good news. But I have to admit I kind of like this idea of those "normalized" ratings for historical players from any time period, so I'm wondering if anybody has ever worked on anything like this before.

3) Finally... For the life of me, I can not seem to figure out how to get the game to lock down strategy settings. I am hoping that I am just missing something. But if I set the historical year so that the rookies import into the draft, then each year at the preseason, the strategy settings reset to the settings for that year. If I try to change the historical year to a year for which I like the strategies, than that is the year the rookies come from. Is there any way to force the game to keep the same strategy/roster settings throughout multiple decades?

I think that is all my questions for now. Thanks in advance for any help you can offer. I obviously am just starting this so any advice, no matter how straightforward it may see, will be appreciated.

David Watts · 07-18-2014, 01:00 PM

Number 3 is just a matter of making sure the box to import strategy yearly is unchecked. You can find this in the historical section of setup. I use it all the time.

There is a user made database (either Gambo or Spritz or a combo of the 2 or maybe a tribo with another great mind) that brings guys in at I want to say 18 years old.

The Game · 07-18-2014, 03:24 PM

1. PM Sprtize for his 15 DB and that will have players when they signed contracts along with all Negro, most Nippon and many PCL players. You can not use Spritze for random debut. i use his for straight 1871 - today play.

Jupiter · 07-18-2014, 05:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by David Watts

Number 3 is just a matter of making sure the box to import strategy yearly is unchecked. You can find this in the historical section of setup. I use it all the time.

There is a user made database (either Gambo or Spritz or a combo of the 2 or maybe a tribo with another great mind) that brings guys in at I want to say 18 years old.

David, thank you. I can't believe I missed that setting on the Historical page! That is exactly what I needed and I have verified that the strategy does now stay as I set it through multiple years, so I think that was all I needed to do.

I will look at some of the other databases available. Having the players come in at a certain age or when they sign their first contract would definitely be preferable (for me for this particular league) to their MLB debut age. So I will look around to see what I can find.

Thanks!

Jupiter · 07-18-2014, 05:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Game

1. PM Sprtize for his 15 DB and that will have players when they signed contracts along with all Negro, most Nippon and many PCL players. You can not use Spritze for random debut. i use his for straight 1871 - today play.

Thank you! The next step I plan to undertake is looking at different databases available to see which one best suits my needs. So I will mark that down as an option. I appreciate it.

The Game · 07-19-2014, 08:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jupiter

Thank you! The next step I plan to undertake is looking at different databases available to see which one best suits my needs. So I will mark that down as an option. I appreciate it.

right now to my knowledge there are only 2. default ootp & sprtize. Gambo who had some of the players a Spritze DB had but with real debut seems to have stopped making his DB's.

07-18-2014, 11:23 AM	#1
Jupiter Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2011 Location: Kansas City, MO Posts: 74	New Historical League Setup Questions I have been playing OOTP for years, but I have only run a historical league once. I've decided to try another to play with OOTP 15 before I transfer my primary league from 14 to 15, so I was just fooling around and my first attempt did not go at all as I planned. So I apologize in advance if some of these questions are very basic, but I am hoping that this is a good spot to ask for advice. If you think the thread is better posted somewhere else, please let me know. I have some specific questions below, but it might be helpful to first explain the overall goal off my league. I would like to create a league that starts at some point in the past (I chose 1940 for my test, but I may start earlier) and, when it has finally run through modern day, includes all real life historical players but has them all playing with the basic strategies and essentially the overall stats of a single time period in history. So essentially I pick a year (1985 in my test, but it could by another year) and choose the overall stat level and strategy settings (5 man rotation, closers, 15 position/10 pitcher rosters, etc.) and then have the historical players enter the league and play in the appropriate years but using those strategies and and tending toward those stats. With the ultimate goal of being able to much better compare the players across time periods once history has played out. I also want to implement the amateur draft and free agency so that all teams are on a more or less equal footing (financials notwithstanding, which I will have to tweak some), rather than having players automatically join their real life team or follow real historical transactions. I suppose this could just be impossible, but I suspect it is much more likely that my first test was just poorly designed. Which is fine... that's why it was a test. But I've disappointed myself somewhat in that even though I now know what didn't work, I don't quite see how to fix it. 1) The first issue I have is probably easy. I set up the amateur draft and all new players are entering the draft appropriately. But they all come in at their debut age and are major-league ready. The last time I tried something like this, I was pretty sure I found a way to have players enter the league when they signed their first contract, so that they came in with lower overall skills and were drafted and played in the minors for a few years. I can not find this option currently. It's not a deal breaker, but it annoys me that I managed it years ago and can not do it now and I don't want to get dumber as I age! Do I need to download a separate database to do this? 2) The second issue is potentially more complicated. In order to get players from all eras to play under the same strategies, I was imagining a set of player ratings that were effectively "normalized", so that the average contact rating (or home runs or avoid power or stuff or any other rating) was essentially the same in any era, probably somewhere around 10 on a 20 point scale, the best would always be 20/20, and then the statistical distribution of the other ratings from best to worst was equalized as well. If I could then lock down the overriding statistical modifiers of the league, then all eras would play to the same totals, regardless of the year. Players from 1940 would come in with their own strengths and weaknesses relative to each other, but at the end of a season, the best contact hitter would strike out 30-50 times and the worst would strike out 150-175 times, regardless of what year they played in or what their original true stats were. When I actually ran it, though, the players imported with ratings that seemed to match their era more so that their talent relative to each other. When I played through 1940-1942 and looked the Avoid K ratings of all batters, the lowest player in the major leagues was 7/20 and the median for the entire league was 16. So it seems like their initial ratings are much more reflective of their era and stats then I had anticipated. I suspect I could do some editing of the players in the database and do the normalization myself, but I am wondering if this has already been done or if I am just missing a setting in the player import that will fix it. My ultimate goal is to get a set of ratings such that the best home run hitter from the deadball era or the best home run hitter from the steroid era would both come in with a home run potential of 20/20 and both would hit 45-55 home runs in their respective prime years, assuming everything goes right. Rather it seems the case that the average potential for the deadball era would be much lower than 10 and the average for the steroid era higher than 10. As a follow up to this, I will say that playing with the statistical modifiers over a number of tests, I seem to be able to force the game to tend toward the 1985 totals for home runs, stolen bases, strikeouts, etc, even with 1940s players. I still have much tweaking to do to get all the stats coming in at the levels I want, but it at least seems possible to get to the right numbers even if the original player ratings are not what I anticipated, so that is good news. But I have to admit I kind of like this idea of those "normalized" ratings for historical players from any time period, so I'm wondering if anybody has ever worked on anything like this before. 3) Finally... For the life of me, I can not seem to figure out how to get the game to lock down strategy settings. I am hoping that I am just missing something. But if I set the historical year so that the rookies import into the draft, then each year at the preseason, the strategy settings reset to the settings for that year. If I try to change the historical year to a year for which I like the strategies, than that is the year the rookies come from. Is there any way to force the game to keep the same strategy/roster settings throughout multiple decades? I think that is all my questions for now. Thanks in advance for any help you can offer. I obviously am just starting this so any advice, no matter how straightforward it may see, will be appreciated.

07-18-2014, 03:24 PM	#3
The Game Hall Of Famer Join Date: Feb 2012 Location: Inside The Game Posts: 30,803	1. PM Sprtize for his 15 DB and that will have players when they signed contracts along with all Negro, most Nippon and many PCL players. You can not use Spritze for random debut. i use his for straight 1871 - today play. __________________ Go today don't wait for tomorrow It isn't promised, all the time you get borrowed Don't live your life for other people Don't bottle your emotions till they crack and fill a couple just sorrows Take your mind and refocus go get a paper write your goals out Throw your middle fingers to all your haters "Stay Strong"

07-18-2014, 01:00 PM	#2
David Watts Hall Of Famer Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Looking for a place called Leehofooks Posts: 8,849	Number 3 is just a matter of making sure the box to import strategy yearly is unchecked. You can find this in the historical section of setup. I use it all the time. There is a user made database (either Gambo or Spritz or a combo of the 2 or maybe a tribo with another great mind) that brings guys in at I want to say 18 years old.