Newbie needs some help adapting OOTP

[Laramiebob]

I recently bought OOTP in an effort to get a more realistic SIM outcome than where I've been playing before. (WIS)

WOW!!! Too complex for this old dog.

I don't want/need all the "fantasy" aspects within the default OOTP program.

I've already figured out that I need to get rid of/disable.....the Minor leagues portion, the Scouting BS, the Coaches, and the finances.

What I'm asking for help with is the player database.
I've determined that you can create teams and then delete the players and that will start a "free agent" pool or player database that you can then import onto various and selected teams. What I'm confused about is HOW do you get a player pool that has multiple YEARS of players???

What I'm attempting to do is create a real player historical database (numerous years/or even a complete time period like 1913-1975) that can then be used for a draft/player selection process to create teams from a specific league year starting point (say 1968) BUT with players from differing years (1968 and prior!!) to compete in league play with other players......AND have static rosters that move forward in time 1 year at a time. (EXample--- a 1968 team composed of some 1968 players BUT with any drafted historical player within the created historical player database (that SHOULD have numerous years to choose from).

I suppose it's kinda backwards to the norm. I WANT to create teams to place into leagues RATHER than create leagues with teams set at a certain year in time.

Can I do that?? Can someone give me step by step help (for a PC illiterate---simple instructions!!) that will aid me in figuring out HOW to use this Ferrari??

Essentially all I want to use of the OOTP program is the SIM game outcome, a player database of my own choosing, and the scheduling for league play part.

I believe in Commissioner mode I can manually force ANY player onto any team roster I want IF the player is in the free agent pool. Is this correct??
If so then HOW do I create a free-agent pool of real historical players from multi-years to create the teams.

Specific example: Can I create a team comprised of 1961 M. Mantle, 1955 W. Mays, 1949 Musial, and 22 other various players from real history using their real life stats???

Please help this newbie. Otherwise this game is useless to me as I'm not into all the fantasy parts (scouting reports, etc). I just want to "hands on" manage a SIM baseball squad wherein I get to decide Pitching changes, PH's, etc. Can I do that with OOTP???

Otherwise...........it's back to WIS, no matter how unrealistic and seemingly flawed their SIM algorithum is.

Please help!! THANKS!!

Laramiebob

[Ike348]

Originally Posted by Laramiebob

I recently bought OOTP in an effort to get a more realistic SIM outcome than where I've been playing before. (WIS)

WOW!!! Too complex for this old dog.

I don't want/need all the "fantasy" aspects within the default OOTP program.

I've already figured out that I need to get rid of/disable.....the Minor leagues portion, the Scouting BS, the Coaches, and the finances.

What I'm asking for help with is the player database.
I've determined that you can create teams and then delete the players and that will start a "free agent" pool or player database that you can then import onto various and selected teams. What I'm confused about is HOW do you get a player pool that has multiple YEARS of players???

What I'm attempting to do is create a real player historical database (numerous years/or even a complete time period like 1913-1975) that can then be used for a draft/player selection process to create teams from a specific league year starting point (say 1968) BUT with players from differing years (1968 and prior!!) to compete in league play with other players......AND have static rosters that move forward in time 1 year at a time. (EXample--- a 1968 team composed of some 1968 players BUT with any drafted historical player within the created historical player database (that SHOULD have numerous years to choose from).

I suppose it's kinda backwards to the norm. I WANT to create teams to place into leagues RATHER than create leagues with teams set at a certain year in time.

Can I do that?? Can someone give me step by step help (for a PC illiterate---simple instructions!!) that will aid me in figuring out HOW to use this Ferrari??

Essentially all I want to use of the OOTP program is the SIM game outcome, a player database of my own choosing, and the scheduling for league play part.

I believe in Commissioner mode I can manually force ANY player onto any team roster I want IF the player is in the free agent pool. Is this correct??
If so then HOW do I create a free-agent pool of real historical players from multi-years to create the teams.

Specific example: Can I create a team comprised of 1961 M. Mantle, 1955 W. Mays, 1949 Musial, and 22 other various players from real history using their real life stats???

Please help this newbie. Otherwise this game is useless to me as I'm not into all the fantasy parts (scouting reports, etc). I just want to "hands on" manage a SIM baseball squad wherein I get to decide Pitching changes, PH's, etc. Can I do that with OOTP???

Otherwise...........it's back to WIS, no matter how unrealistic and seemingly flawed their SIM algorithum is.

Please help!! THANKS!!

Laramiebob

What I managed to gather from that is that you want to import historical players into your game. This is so simple, an OOTP noob can do it

Simply make a text file with the player's ID followed by the year. To find the ID, search the player on baseball-reference. The last part before the ".shtml" is the playerID. A sample text file would be this:

mantlmi01,1961
mayswi01,1955
musiast01,1949

Once you've made the file, make sure you're in commish mode and go to the free agent screen. Click "Import Historical Player", and select the Master.csv which should come up. Then, go to the next screen and click "Select File". Navigate to where your file is and select it.

You can turn on/off all of the other options if you want. If you need to know what they are just ask.

Once the players import, click on one and go into the player editor. You can change the team there. Do this to all of the players. If you need more help, let me know.

[NYY #23]

Welcome aboard, and I'll try to help you out.

The good part is that the player database comes with the game, so you can import any player in history for whatever year that you want.

I think what I would do is start a historical league in the year that you want (1968 for example). Then from the League Menu select List all MLB players at the bottom under the transactions menu. Use the radio button to select all players, right click and then delete. That would get you the league structure with 1968 settings, and empty rosters.

I'm not sure if you want all teams, but if you wanted less than the number of teams in the year selected you can go in to Game, Setup and Options, League Setup, Functions, and Edit League Structure. You can delete any teams, divisions, etc. Just remember to regenerate the schedule after changing the number of teams with the generate schedule button.

Once you determine your player population I think that the best way is to create a text file. Each line would look like this:

benchjo01,1965
mayswi01,1955

It would be the first five of the last name, the first two of the first name, and typically 01(unless it's a common name) then comma year. You can look up the player ID at baseball reference, or in the Master.csv file inside of the OOTP/stats folder.

Once you do that go to Free Agents, select Import Historical Player, select historical_database.odb, select click here to select text file then select the path to the text file that you created. Since you are using multiple years you may want to select Base Current Ratings on Neutralized Stats, then Import Player.

You can go in and edit the players to the team in commish mode, or another thing that you could do is this:

Game, Setup, League Setup, select Import/Export then Export Rosters. Go to your saved game location and go to the import_export folder. It should look something like this:

C:\Users\Dad\Documents\Out of the Park Developments\OOTP Baseball 14\saved_games\NFL.lg\import_export

You can open up that file, then find the Player ID, and in the third column change the Team ID for all of the players you want to move.

//Player ID, deleted, Team ID,

The Team IDs are listed in the roster file. Once you make all of your changes save the file, then follow the same path as above, but select Import Rosters, pick your file and everyone will be on their new team.

Hopefully that makes sense, and I understood your question, but feel free to ask additional info.

Edit: I got a phone call in the middle of answering, so I didn't see Ike348 answer. I think our answers match. The import will work with either the master.csv, or the historical_database.odb. The roster import/export is optional. Hopefully my answer didn't confuse you more.

[Laramiebob]

Thanks to each of you posters for your replies. I will be attempting to follow your instructions and "create" a 16 team league with various historical players from all years prior to (and including) 1968. It would appear to me that to accomplish what I wish to do with OOTP I need to use the recalc settings NOT the "development" mode. Would you all agree with that conclusion?

It is likely I'll be back with more questions as I'm not very PC competent. Even creating a text file is a bit iffy.

Thank you all for your continued help. I hope to become a huge fan of OOTP and its SIM game program.

LB

[The Game]

Originally Posted by Laramiebob

Thanks to each of you posters for your replies. I will be attempting to follow your instructions and "create" a 16 team league with various historical players from all years prior to (and including) 1968. It would appear to me that to accomplish what I wish to do with OOTP I need to use the recalc settings NOT the "development" mode. Would you all agree with that conclusion?

It is likely I'll be back with more questions as I'm not very PC competent. Even creating a text file is a bit iffy.

Thank you all for your continued help. I hope to become a huge fan of OOTP and its SIM game program.

LB

They gave you great input. Here is a sample of a text file.
It is the players ID from baseball reference.com found in the address bar. I find it easiest to double click the players ID - Right click - copy & paste into the text file. Takes me 10 mins to do 50 players.
attached is a sample from my top 25 league

[Laramiebob]

Never has a purchase made me feel so inadequate and dumb!!

I'm back AFTER attempting to follow the help posted above. NADA!!
No go. I just spent 2+ hours fooling around trying to figure out HOW to make this game work. I ended up just attempting to delete my league entirely to start over.

Now when I try to open the game I get an error message saying OOTP has "encountered problems" and needs to close!!

This game may be great BUT for inexperienced computer doofusses like me it's incomprehensible. The instructions and HELP is just NOT sufficient.

I'd love to figure this out but I'm about to just consider it hopeless and contact my Credit card company and cancel my charge. My time is too valuable to just be wasted because someone can't write comprehensible instructions.

Anyone care to try to help or do I just stick with WIS and forget I ever heard about OOTP? This completely bites. No one likes to be frustrated like this!!!

L.Bob

[Ike348]

Hang in there bud. What exactly did you do? If you give us step-by-step what you did then one of us can help you out.

[The Game]

Originally Posted by Laramiebob

Never has a purchase made me feel so inadequate and dumb!!

I'm back AFTER attempting to follow the help posted above. NADA!!
No go. I just spent 2+ hours fooling around trying to figure out HOW to make this game work. I ended up just attempting to delete my league entirely to start over.

Now when I try to open the game I get an error message saying OOTP has "encountered problems" and needs to close!!

This game may be great BUT for inexperienced computer doofusses like me it's incomprehensible. The instructions and HELP is just NOT sufficient.

I'd love to figure this out but I'm about to just consider it hopeless and contact my Credit card company and cancel my charge. My time is too valuable to just be wasted because someone can't write comprehensible instructions.

Anyone care to try to help or do I just stick with WIS and forget I ever heard about OOTP? This completely bites. No one likes to be frustrated like this!!!

L.Bob

I re-read your 1st post.
You want to add teams from different years into a league? or just players?
Do you want to start with a particular season, say 1968?
No finances no coaches?
Do you have a list of team or coaches?
I will create the league for you. All you will have to do is download it and put it into your quickstart folder and start playing. I can get this done tonight depending how much you want in it. Real photos or facegen?

EDIT: I can post screen shots to give you step by step instructions. Your 1st post is unclear on what you are exactly trying to do.

[Laramiebob]

I created a ML historical league for 1968. I deleted all the players hoping to set up a free agent pool so that I could then force (commish mode) any player I wanted onto any team I wanted.

I deleted some teams to get down to 16. I added 1 division per league (NL/AL). I tried to change some team nicknames. Tried to even change some names. Tried to add 3 teams.

Ended up with NO free agent pool at all. Then gave up and decided to start over so I deleted the entire league.

When I go to restart the OOTP program, my deleted game is still listed, BUT when you try to open it the whole program shuts down.

I'm about to conclude this game is just NOT for people who are not PC experts. I don't understand about 2/3rds of the terminology used in the help guide/manual.

I just want a computerized SIM baseball experience. NOT a bunch of fantasy player development stuff, scouting BS, coaching advise, or tiers of minor league stuff.

Basically just a WIS type league competition (or strat-o-matic type SIM) but with a much better and more controllable SIM function than is possible at WIS.

I can see that is here within OOTP but it is so camouflaged with all these bells and whistles that automatically load in with the game that trying to customize it DOWN to just the features I want is ridiculously time consuming and incomprehensible to me.

Can't someone just figure out how to eliminate all the features except the (very cool and adjustable) SIM mechanism, the player databases, and the league scheduleing feature???

I'm really not as stupid as this is making me feel.
I'm a baseball lover and knowledgable baseball strategist. Played the game for decades. I'm NOT a computer geek or guru.

This is just way too complicated for the instructions that is furnished with the game. IMO.

I don't want to spend weeks setting up each and every league and then have a PC zip thru an entire season in less time than it took me to figure out HOW to get the players in the league I want---on the teams within the league per some sort of multi-manager draft between my friends and co-SIM baseball players/friends.

Anyone ever play on WIS (What If sports)??
I want something simple like that, BUT with a better SIM/game control----------like appears to be included within OOTP.

Is that too much to ask for??

L.Bob

[The Game]

Originally Posted by Laramiebob

I created a ML historical league for 1968. I deleted all the players hoping to set up a free agent pool so that I could then force (commish mode) any player I wanted onto any team I wanted.

I deleted some teams to get down to 16. I added 1 division per league (NL/AL). I tried to change some team nicknames. Tried to even change some names. Tried to add 3 teams.

Ended up with NO free agent pool at all. Then gave up and decided to start over so I deleted the entire league.

When I go to restart the OOTP program, my deleted game is still listed, BUT when you try to open it the whole program shuts down.

I am gonna go step by step which team do you want to keep?

[The Game]

Are you starting this as a 1968 historical league or as a fictional league?

[Laramiebob]

"I re-read your 1st post.
You want to add teams from different years into a league? or just players?
Do you want to start with a particular season, say 1968?
No finances no coaches?
Do you have a list of team or coaches?
I will create the league for you. All you will have to do is download it and put it into your quickstart folder and start playing. I can get this done tonight depending how much you want in it. Real photos or facegen?

EDIT: I can post screen shots to give you step by step instructions. Your 1st post is unclear on what you are exactly trying to do. __________________"

This is a VERY kind offer. Thank YOU!!!

This is what I want.

I want to be able to create leagues using real historical players with nuetralized (for ballpark) stats with the ability to select/draft any player (any year of players career) from history and create 25 man rosters for each team. Once done, I want the ability to have these 25 man teams play in leagues against each other and advance in age one season at a time.

Example:

I might create a team with some 1968 Pitchers, some 1930's era position players, some modern closers, etc. It might have a compilation of players from 25 different years or 3 differing years (or even just one, which seems easy to do!!) Following the completion of the season, I'd like the players to advance to their next playable year (if not injured or retired).

Single player example: So, the 25 man squad might have say 1935 Ernie Lombardi as catcher. The next season he'd be 1936 Lombardi and be on the same 25 man squad. I'd like that squad to be able to trade him to another of the league's teams for one of their players IF desirable to the managers/team owners.

I basically just want SIM competition with other baseball lovers in leagues where we control the rosters content. Like possible at WIS BUT with a better SIM "feature" than WIS has available. I think the SIM program here at OOTP can do that. It seems far superior to the WIS SIM.

The ability to adjust the weight application (for one example) is awesome. So is the ability to adjust the minimum AB or IP settings to determine at what level to "override" the players stats when the player didn't play enough for the stats to be as meaningful.

IF you really want to help me with this (that would be unbelievably kind) I could create an entire player database (for an example league) for you and forward it to you. What would really be best is to have a free agent pool that consisted of every player (and every year played by the player) from say 1885 to 2013 (14) etc.

However for starters maybe we could just use 1968 as an example and I'd send you a supplemental list of (say) 32 players to add to the 1968 player database/free agent pool. Just to attempt to teach me HOW to create my own player databases.

Does this explanation make any sense?

And you are correct, I don't want scouts, coaches, tiers of minor leagues, etc. IF the feature is related to the "fantasy" aspect of OOTP I probably don't want it.
I just want a more controllable SIM game so as to achieve (marginally-at least) fairly realistic results when using nuetralized or normalized stats from real players in ML history!!

Thanks for being so kind and helpful.

L.Bob

[The Game]

I have a 1968 historical league. No changes to teams or players yet.

[The Game]

Originally Posted by Laramiebob

"I re-read your 1st post.
You want to add teams from different years into a league? or just players?
Do you want to start with a particular season, say 1968?
No finances no coaches?
Do you have a list of team or coaches?
I will create the league for you. All you will have to do is download it and put it into your quickstart folder and start playing. I can get this done tonight depending how much you want in it. Real photos or facegen?

EDIT: I can post screen shots to give you step by step instructions. Your 1st post is unclear on what you are exactly trying to do. __________________"

This is a VERY kind offer. Thank YOU!!!

This is what I want.

I want to be able to create leagues using real historical players with nuetralized (for ballpark) stats with the ability to select/draft any player (any year of players career) from history and create 25 man rosters for each team. Once done, I want the ability to have these 25 man teams play in leagues against each other and advance in age one season at a time.

Example:

I might create a team with some 1968 Pitchers, some 1930's era position players, some modern closers, etc. It might have a compilation of players from 25 different years or 3 differing years (or even just one, which seems easy to do!!) Following the completion of the season, I'd like the players to advance to their next playable year (if not injured or retired).

Single player example: So, the 25 man squad might have say 1935 Ernie Lombardi as catcher. The next season he'd be 1936 Lombardi and be on the same 25 man squad. I'd like that squad to be able to trade him to another of the league's teams for one of their players IF desirable to the managers/team owners.

I basically just want SIM competition with other baseball lovers in leagues where we control the rosters content. Like possible at WIS BUT with a better SIM "feature" than WIS has available. I think the SIM program here at OOTP can do that. It seems far superior to the WIS SIM.

The ability to adjust the weight application (for one example) is awesome. So is the ability to adjust the minimum AB or IP settings to determine at what level to "override" the players stats when the player didn't play enough for the stats to be as meaningful.

IF you really want to help me with this (that would be unbelievably kind) I could create an entire player database (for an example league) for you and forward it to you. What would really be best is to have a free agent pool that consisted of every player (and every year played by the player) from say 1885 to 2013 (14) etc.

However for starters maybe we could just use 1968 as an example and I'd send you a supplemental list of (say) 32 players to add to the 1968 player database/free agent pool. Just to attempt to teach me HOW to create my own player databases.

Does this explanation make any sense?

And you are correct, I don't want scouts, coaches, tiers of minor leagues, etc. IF the feature is related to the "fantasy" aspect of OOTP I probably don't want it.
I just want a more controllable SIM game so as to achieve (marginally-at least) fairly realistic results when using nuetralized or normalized stats from real players in ML history!!

Thanks for being so kind and helpful.

L.Bob

Creating a 1968 Random Debut league would be best. Do you have any players you specifically want in your league in year one?

A random debut league can start at any year of your choosing and you can have a 38 yr old Rogers Hornsby, a 20 yr old Babe Ruth a 31 yr old Tris Speaker etc. At the end of the season you will draft players or have them come in as FA's ( I have never tried to have these players go to their actual teams and not sure if that would work) RD works best with neutralized stats

What start year do you want and give me small list of players you want in the Inaugural Draft. I also like accurate parks, logos & uniforms. So they will be accurate for the season you want but you will have to download the uniforms and logos for it to progress to the next year otherwise they will stay the same.
If you want the same files I am using...
Download the 1st file here and after unzipping it put it in your logos folder.
Logos | OOTPMODS.COM

download the 2 files from this thread for uniforms 1901-1969
http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...-uniforms.html

download files from this thread for uniforms 1970 - 2013.
http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...y-project.html

You will have to either manually load caps & jerseys or separate the caps and out them in the caps folder and the jerseys into the jerseys folder.
Unzip Reds1 file and do his 1st then the AL & NL sets overwriting any Reds1 uniforms.

[NYY #23]

Originally Posted by Laramiebob

I created a ML historical league for 1968. I deleted all the players hoping to set up a free agent pool so that I could then force (commish mode) any player I wanted onto any team I wanted.

I deleted some teams to get down to 16. I added 1 division per league (NL/AL). I tried to change some team nicknames. Tried to even change some names. Tried to add 3 teams.

Ended up with NO free agent pool at all. Then gave up and decided to start over so I deleted the entire league.

I hope I didn't steer you wrong. Because I had you delete all the players they would be gone. I misunderstood the part where you wanted to keep some 1968 players, or I didn't realize how many you wanted to keep.

If you intend to keep a lot of 1968 players it might be beneficial to release all players and schedule an inaugural draft (under League Setup/Functions).

You could control all teams during the draft, and then delete and fill in through the player import.

The good part of this game is you can do anything. The bad part is it can be complex. There is a lot of people here who will definitely try to help you though, like The Game and Ike348.

[The Game]

So i made a 1968 Random Debut league. You can delete any tams you do not want. If you do not want the 1969 2 division format and expansion team uncheck Expand League under League Setup - Historical. It is one of the screenshots I have.
If you want to add any players to the league, put yourself in Commish mode. go to Draft Pool - Import historical players. Select historical database.odb under the OOTP 14 stats folder. If you have a notepad text file of players select that and select your options, including add players to next draft, and hit import they will be added to the draft pool. You can do the same under the FA screen also.
RD 1968

unzip this and cut the RD 1968.LG and paste it into your saved games folder then load the league from the Load Saved Games option. Come back if you have issues.

[Laramiebob]

I sent you a PM in response to this thread ("The Game"). Hope you get it. LB

[Ike348]

Glad to see you're getting there and not as frustrated as you were before.