Should there be fewer Perfect Leagues?

[HRBaker]

Originally Posted by Orcin

This poll is not scientific because the sample is not random. The results are meaningless and no valid conclusions can be drawn from it.

I have to ask... do you have an obsession about me Orcin?

Did I say it was scientific? And the results are only meaningless if you don't give a damn about peoples opinions.

25 people think there are too many Perfect Teams. Period.

[Ty Cobb]

26 now think so. The path to promotion is far too easy, the path to relegation far too steep.

I'm of the opinion that promotion should not be automatic based on winning a WS. I know of someone who recently won their diamond WS with an 86 or 87 win team that snuck into the wildcard. They got hot at the right time...but they weren't even one of 5 best teams in the league.

Win 100+ games...get promoted.
Lose 100+ games...get relegated.

These two should be absolutes. They are the historic guidelines for really, really good teams, and really, really bad ones.

Win 3 WS in a row at your level...automatic promotion, regardless of record.
Finish last 3 seasons in a row without relegating...automatic relegation, regardless of record.

Just some suggestions...your mileage, as with your opinions, may vary.

[dkgo]

That's getting too complicated.

I don't really mind a tower structure where you have an even number of teams at each tier compared to a pyramid structure where only a small percent are perfect leagues. There just needs to be more fluidity so that teams can get to their proper level.

For example if you had even levels and all 8 playoff teams get promoted and the bottom 8 got relegated things would be fine. The hardcore whales could still form their own perfect league if they wanted and it would spread out the solo super whales amongst more leagues so that more teams have an ability to compete. This helps developers because players are more likely to buy some points when you see you are just a little bit away compared to finishing 50 games out of the division and needing a million points worth of upgrades.

[Ty Cobb]

Originally Posted by Orcin

This poll is not scientific because the sample is not random. The results are meaningless and no valid conclusions can be drawn from it.

I'll grant you the poll is unscientific. I'll grant you the sample is not random. What I'll point out is that of the 41 (at this time) people who've responded, nearly 2/3 agree with OP's premise.

51% is an almost meaningless margin. 63% is a darn big margin. If enough users weigh in and that pace continues, this might be an idea to put forth. The big problem with the poll is that the sample size is too small to have relevance. 41 users out of what, 10000 teams, is not statistically significant.

[Orcin]

Originally Posted by Ty Cobb

I'll grant you the poll is unscientific. I'll grant you the sample is not random. What I'll point out is that of the 41 (at this time) people who've responded, nearly 2/3 agree with OP's premise.

51% is an almost meaningless margin. 63% is a darn big margin. If enough users weigh in and that pace continues, this might be an idea to put forth. The big problem with the poll is that the sample size is too small to have relevance. 41 users out of what, 10000 teams, is not statistically significant.

The margin in a poll that is unscientific is meaningless. If the margin were 100%, it still means nothing.

If you want a meaningful answer, ask the developers. At present, you are polling "non-voters".

[dkgo]

he's not publishing an article in a scientific journal here

the results are "meaningful" in that they are the opinions of heavily invested users, no more no less

[Orcin]

Originally Posted by dkgo

he's not publishing an article in a scientific journal here

the results are "meaningful" in that they are the opinions of heavily invested users, no more no less

If your conclusion is that 26 of 42 heavily-invested users agree that there are too many perfect leagues, then the results of the poll support that conclusion.

If your conclusion is that the majority of heavily-invested users agree that there are too many perfect leagues, then the results of the poll do not support that conclusion because the poll is unscientific.

[HRBaker]

Removed

[Cheesehead1964]

There definitely needs to be a league between Diamond and Perfect (or above Perfect or whatever) to push the whales up.

My teams have been competitive in Diamond but I got curb stomped in my first foray into Perfect last season. And made almost zero PP, which makes it hard to build anything.

It's only June and when all my teams get promoted to Perfect, I'm going to lose interest very quickly.

I haven't minded putting a few bucks into the game but won't put the type of money in required to compete with the whales. It would be nice to still be interested in this game in August and September (heck, July even).

[Ty Cobb]

Originally Posted by Orcin

If your conclusion is that 26 of 42 heavily-invested users agree that there are too many perfect leagues, then the results of the poll support that conclusion.

If your conclusion is that the majority of heavily-invested users agree that there are too many perfect leagues, then the results of the poll do not support that conclusion because the poll is unscientific.

Please...show us all what would constitute a scientific poll so we can put this to bed and get on with the real focus of this thread. If you are unable to offer a suitable alternative, I'd suggest letting this go.

[matingly23]

Originally Posted by lightningbolts35

I believe there needs to be a league between Diamond and Perfect. As someone else said, there is a huge difference between the two. Perfect should be the best of the best... Also, for the whales. Right now, I've been in Perfect for three years. Twice, my league was loaded with whales (6-8 whale teams). Those teams had winning records and all but about two other teams had losing records. The other time I was in a league with only two whale teams and half the teams had winning records and divisions and wild cards were hotly contested.

Now, don't get me wrong, I have nothing against whale teams. They paid a good price to have their team. But for most people who are not willing to spend a lot of money, there should be a league for them that is competitive. People shouldn't feel they have to spend a ton of money or hope for luck of the draw to be in a competitive league.

So what's the answer to the problem... I'm not totally sure. To me, the top four teams by record should move up to the next level up to diamond league. From there, the next two leagues in my scenario should be League champions only move up. Regulated teams should be the bottom four teams by record. I would also suggest that teams that purposely play to lose should be reported and not regulated to a lower league. Not that any of this matters, it's just my opinion...

I like the "OL" concept and using a friends list once you're in Perfect. If you're a F2P team it's the only way to have a level playing field at that level. There aren't too many teams there, just too many whales for a good F2P experience.

[nickwatic]

Originally Posted by Morug

Its kinda strange to be in perfect league without winning a championship. Only the winner in Diamond must advance in my opinion. I lost in final of diamond but i dont think my team is ready for perfect league. I'll try to win anyway in perfect, but I dont see my team in the playoff soon in perfect.

I have 0 championships and I've been in perfect for a few seasons now

[HRBaker]

There's a number of ways that have been suggested to improve the problem. The "problem" being defined as nowhere to go once you reach Perfect. You either become a whale ($$) or become a punching bag. I think we all understand that OOTP is in business to make money - and we don't want that to change - but we question whether too many people will become disenchanted with their results if the "end game" for 80% of us is always to become a punching bag.

Here's some of the ideas that have been forwarded... forgive me if I forgot a few.

1. Add Levels to tighten the talent spread (this was done in PT2 and didn't seem to have much effect. Winners in Perfect still see spreads of up to 70 games)
2. Increase Promotions/Relegations (changing out weaker teams in Perfect more often MIGHT at least relieve the punching bag syndrome.)
3. Promote/Relegate based on W/L records only (try and move more qualified teams up rather than winners in the playoffs with sometimes are barely over .500)
4. Reduce number of teams in Perfect (make it harder to get into perfect in the first place)
5. Assign teams to levels based on W/L records of previous year. (best teams in Perfect - worst teams in Iron)

All of these ideas have pros and cons, but none of them are proven - and maybe the answer is a combination of two or more of these ideas - but it is clear the current system doesn't give most of us what we want either.

Orcin was right about one thing - the OOTP Team is who will, ultimately, make the decision if one is to be made.

On the other hand, I disagree with the claim that we're not the people that get to vote. Customers ALWAYS have a vote through the money they spend on a game. IF a game ultimately fails or studders, it's because the customers found something else to fill their time and entertain them.

I honestly hope these concerns are considered by OOTP, and effort by the Devs will be spent to better balance the game. I think there are plenty of customers willing to spend a few hundred dollars if there is a prize at the end that warrants that expenditure. If the OOTP Team can find a balance that pleases BOTH the whales AND the rest of us, I'm sure their balance sheet will always be in the black.

[Calvert98]

Some interesting ideas in this thread.

However, I do feel that the Perfect Level and PT in general, is sort of working the way it is supposed to.

I will use my situation as an example, because it is possible that a number of folks are in my boat.....

I like PT, and have a Free-to-Play team, but basically I use that mode as a "side-car", to my OOTP experience, when I don't have time for my main game, or when waiting for the first couple patches and MLB Opening Day roster updates, before I start my MLB Universe.

Now, my FTP team is in its first Perfect level season, but I never won a Championship at any level, and it is looking rather rough. So, after spending time trying to figure out options in the AH, I upgraded one Gold RP and one Gold 89 SP, and that is all I could do. So, I used 10,000 PPs on packs in the past two days, for the "rare" chance I may pull a Perfect Card, you know...for more PPs to buy other cards. I pulled 3 golds, so the net loss was about 6,000 after selling them, and a few bronzes. I went from 15,000+ PP to about 5,800 PP in two days.

But I thought, "the next patch is coming-out with the Draft-update, I made it to the Perfect Level with my FTP team, and I am starting a new Standard MLB Universe next week, so let's take a chance."

So now, it's cruise-control time again for PT. I will check-in once in a while for a few minutes here and there, but the upper tiers of PT are targeted to folks who are more vested, not folks like myself. To that, I can see where the current arrangement works for that them and why the overall structure is tailored for that type of thing.

[joehart]

Why do we have such large disparity between teams?
Could it be that the difference between good player cards and very good cards is too much?

Personally, I was not a fan of the introduction of Legend cards that separated the top cards by too much from the rest of the pack.
It helped teams/managers become less involved and cruise control to 110-130 wins/season.

I feel like there is more enjoyment when I get to select a team from thousands of cards instead of the same 50 cards that are currently used by most of the whale teams.
It feels a bit boring when you face the same team again and again just with a different team name.

I am sure the introduction of the Legend cards fueled the spending and helped the overall development of the game.
Not sure people would spend the same amount if there are hundreds of similar players and the difference between worst card in the game and best card in the game was not as big.

I don’t believe there is a quick fix to address it all.
If you add more relegations, you may end up hearing how people ride the elevator up and down every week and then just play every other week after they got relegated back down to Diamond.

Maybe it is time to just accept what we have until Markus and team look at the data of the PT universe and decide what the next version should look and play like.

[Calvert98]

All good points Joe.

I do think that for folks who are FTP or don't want to spend a lot of $, the tournaments and collections, may be a way to keep-up and involved, and provide some variety for using other types of various cards.

[MarkGracesSlumpBuster]

removed