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Old 01-04-2019, 02:27 AM   #1
Rob29
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New to OOTP and Lost in the Wilderness

I purchased OOTP because it was only five dollars. I'm not interested in any of the financial or GM stuff. I just want to play the games.

1. Autoplay a season. Replay one team in a season. Replay one starting pitcher. All this with the as-played schedule, real lineups, and actual transactions. Totally lost.

Create a league. Pick the teams. Create a schedule. Play every game and manage both teams. Totally lost.

In other PC games I have, all this is very easy to do. In other PC games I have, I click enter and boom, the play result is there. With OOTP videos I've seen, I can see a game taking two hours to play with the text, watching the ball, and having to choose all the defensive options.

Did I waste five dollars?
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Old 01-04-2019, 11:15 AM   #2
BirdWatcher
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My personal bias is that you did not waste $5 but rather that it could be the best investment of $5 you ever made.
However, it is true that there is a steep learning curve with this game. Which is mostly a reflection of just how inclusive and in-depth the game is.
My advice is to start small and simple and work your way up to a more complex approach.
For instance, you could just be the GM for a team and deal with issues of player acquisition and finances (or not finances, if you want to turn that off to begin with.) Let the manager make the in-game decisions. Okay, scratch that last bit. Not what you want. So, yes,(Or vice versa), more like that. Much of the time in-game strategy should be fairly straight-forward. Most of the time you will just swing away when on offense, for instance. If you want to go pitch-by-pitch, well, then yes, games will take longer. I'm an at-bat-by-at-bat guy myself. Even with you calling strategy, once you get the hang of it, games shouldn't take terribly long.
Me, I play as GM and manager but do very little in-game management- rather I use strategy settings to influence in-game play and then watch the game mostly as spectator. A single game goes by pretty quickly.) To start with, I think it is always good to set responsibilities for things like minor league strategies and player movement,etc. to someone other than you (i.e. the AI team personnel). (There is a great deal more advice in this vein that I am sure others will offer here. And I also encourage you to poke around the forums here and on Reddit as you will find a good deal of tips for new OOTP'ers most of which are extremely helpful and certainly got me through my early days playing this game. And which I still return to on a regular basis as a refresher.)

From what I've seen one of the biggest challenges new OOTP'ers have is that they have a very specific idea that they want the game to recreate, one that often has more to do with their past gaming experience, whether it be video/computer or tabletop, and they struggle to figure out how to get OOTP to do that. I myself came to OOTP from a tabletop (Strat-O-Matic, Replay, mostly) background but what I realized quite early on is that OOTP was not a way for me to do exactly what I did on a tabletop (only better) but was a whole new simulation gaming experience. It's not that OOTP can't recreate some of the scenarios that new gamers have in their heads (often it can, sometimes not so much) but rather that this is probably something better approached after getting to know OOTP better for what it is and what it is best designed to do.

For me part of the fun of OOTP when I first purchased the game was figuring it out. And failing. And learning from that. And failing again, but in a smarter way. Etc, etc. (Rinse and repeat, as others tend to put it.)

Last edited by BirdWatcher; 01-04-2019 at 11:20 AM. Reason: re-read OP, fixing my response
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Old 01-04-2019, 11:23 AM   #3
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Having said all of that, I think it is worth noting that while OOTP can be played and enjoyed so many different ways, if you really have absolutely no interest in the GM/financial bits, you might not get as much value out of the game as I have.
OOTP is, first and foremost, a sports management sim. This is where it shines the brightest and what sets it apart from so many other baseball simulations. In the end, it may just not be what you are looking for.
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Old 01-04-2019, 11:25 AM   #4
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I think you could get started pretty quickly if you're just looking to see results. Do an MLB 2018 quickstart game, pick your favorite team, start simulating. That should get results fast.

Then you can tweak your playing style however you want - watching the games, managing games, simulating only and looking at box scores, making trades, drafting, changing teams, playing different eras, doing fictional leagues, on and on.
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Old 01-04-2019, 03:24 PM   #5
Rob29
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Going into OOTP, I realized it might not be for me, but the five dollar price made it worth taking a chance. I have PC Replay, so I'm looking for OOTP to be like that.

I did figure out how to autoplay a past season. It was 1971 and the overall numbers were good. I couldn't find a way to view real stats and the replay stats together. Looking at Baltimore, Frank Robinson was nowhere to be found.

I still don't know how to create a fictional league with real players on stock teams. Say, a league with the Indians teams from their 90s playoff run.
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Old 01-04-2019, 03:56 PM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rob29 View Post
Going into OOTP, I realized it might not be for me, but the five dollar price made it worth taking a chance. I have PC Replay, so I'm looking for OOTP to be like that.

I did figure out how to autoplay a past season. It was 1971 and the overall numbers were good. I couldn't find a way to view real stats and the replay stats together. Looking at Baltimore, Frank Robinson was nowhere to be found.

I still don't know how to create a fictional league with real players on stock teams. Say, a league with the Indians teams from their 90s playoff run.
Ah, it's been awhile since I played the PC version of Replay but I was quite a big Replay gamer for awhile.
While I wouldn't say that OOTP and the PC version of Replay (or SOM, etc.) are apples and oranges, they might be oranges and grapefruits.
There are settings and approaches that one can use in OOTP to simulate real-life MLB with great accuracy but this isn't the game's real wheelhouse. For me it is all of the extra stuff that OOTP includes, which largely does mean all of that GM/financials stuff that you may not be interested in, that have led me to become pretty obsessed with this game.
And don't get me wrong- I love Replay and what Pete has done with that game.
OOTP is just not really a one-to-one replacement for that. My suggestion would be to maybe look at OOTP as another color of baseball simulation to add to your palette.

For me it has been a steal at $40 and probably the best investment of $40 I've made in my life. But that implies no criticism of you if you end up feeling like this was $5 wasted. OOTP isn't going to scratch everybody's itch.

As for the more specific issues you mention here- like creating a fictional league with real players- well, I'm quite sure that can be done but since it isn't a way that I have played the game I will let someone with more experience walk you through that.

I hope that you hang in there a bit with the game so that you can at least get your $5 worth out of it. As a former Replay-er who still has much fondness for that game (particularly in the cards and dice form), I am absolutely convinced that if you give OOTP a chance on its terms you will find it to be a fabulous baseball management simulation.
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Old 01-13-2019, 01:19 PM   #7
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rob29 View Post
I purchased OOTP because it was only five dollars. I'm not interested in any of the financial or GM stuff. I just want to play the games.

1. Autoplay a season. Replay one team in a season. Replay one starting pitcher. All this with the as-played schedule, real lineups, and actual transactions. Totally lost.

Create a league. Pick the teams. Create a schedule. Play every game and manage both teams. Totally lost.

In other PC games I have, all this is very easy to do. In other PC games I have, I click enter and boom, the play result is there. With OOTP videos I've seen, I can see a game taking two hours to play with the text, watching the ball, and having to choose all the defensive options.

Did I waste five dollars?
I think your mistake may be expecting to master the game too soon.
There are many of us who have played the game for over 15 years and
still learn new things.
I would suggest taking your time and play many different ways.
Go to different settings in the game and experiment.
Take your time and enjoy the game and pretty soon it will take over your life too.
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Old 01-15-2019, 07:22 PM   #8
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i played with 100% accuracy and the defaults mostly.. tried to focus on learning a few things at a time.

when i first bought it, i tried to customize everything and got frustrated. set it down and didn't play again for months. kept it simple the next go around and had much better results.. then, once i had a better baseline i could costumize with at least some idea of what the exact effect would be.

historical play is a bit different... you'll have a few more choices to understand. the recalc of players and whether or not to let it run wild with random changes based on engine and not history etc etc etc...

most of it is what you expect based on verbage and common perceptions, but sometimes not so much. don't be afraid to experiement and if not picky you'll enjoy it right away.. if picky like me, it may take a bit of comfort and the right set of rules and statistical environment

i can't see a game taking 2 hours unless you want it to. you can speed up some of that stuff to your preference as far as the visuals and text print out. how long it takes to play a game is all a matter of how much you delay moving to next pitch/decision etc, if you want it to move quicker.

if you like simulation baseball games, you'll most likely feel you did not waste your money once you get comfortable with it. it is robust and deep. you have a lot of control or you can delegate what you find boring. it can be as simple or complicated as you want it.

Last edited by NoOne; 01-15-2019 at 07:24 PM.
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