Tanking?

[dkgo]

Has there been discussion about real money only being used to buy packs instead of PP directly? This is the only game I've seen it work this way. Everyone knows buying singles are more efficient than opening packs, so new cards rarely enter the PT economy outside of new players or challenge mode achievements. The incentive could be in packs not PP which just cause inflation the more you put into the market without increasing card supply.

That would be a reduction to what you get for your money but also reduces prices of cards overall since there is more availability. Maybe it's just a problem this late in the game, but I find it really annoying that I have to check the auction house for days just to find a specific silver player who trades for a couple hundred PP. the health of the game's economy over a full year with everyone now having some experience is concerning

[eldur00]

Originally Posted by dkgo

Has there been discussion about real money only being used to buy packs instead of PP directly? This is the only game I've seen it work this way. Everyone knows buying singles are more efficient than opening packs, so new cards rarely enter the PT economy outside of new players or challenge mode achievements. The incentive could be in packs not PP which just cause inflation the more you put into the market without increasing card supply.

That would be a reduction to what you get for your money but also reduces prices of cards overall since there is more availability. Maybe it's just a problem this late in the game, but I find it really annoying that I have to check the auction house for days just to find a specific silver player who trades for a couple hundred PP. the health of the game's economy over a full year with everyone now having some experience is concerning

Other pay to win games also give the option to buy points and then you get to spend them the way you want (the Show for example, does this, but the Show also rewards you with a free card after every game, and free packs here and there, which helps put cards back into circulation - granted the likelihood of those cards being good is always very low, but it helps a bit). Depending on how much you play, it wouldn't surprise me many people earn the equivalent of 100 packs over the year without buying a single one. That's quite a bit of cards put back into circulation.



And before this starts another argument - pay to win does not mean you absolutely need to buy points to win, compete or have fun. Pay to Win's definition, found on Wikipedia, is literally "In general a game is considered pay-to-win when a player can gain any gameplay advantage over his non-paying peers.", which this game (and many other) is doing.

[bailey]

This thread is supposed to be about tanking. And it was interesting because the accused actually posted in his defense. Not that I agree with his defense, but it was interesting. You can't compete with a THEMED team even if you spend $150 on it is what he proved. Even a Red Sox team. I imagine a Brewers team would be lucky to avoid losing 100 games each week.

[Kushiel]

I wish there was a reset button too so this would not come up. But as the game stands now there is not.

Tanking adversely effects every other player in PT. A few reap a bonanza, everybody else gets little or nothing, most get nothing. I am sure this is at least partly why it is against the rules to lose on purpose. And it is against the rules.

Petition for a reset but in the meantime play by the rules.

[Mizzery]

Originally Posted by bailey

This thread is supposed to be about tanking. And it was interesting because the accused actually posted in his defense. Not that I agree with his defense, but it was interesting. You can't compete with a THEMED team even if you spend $150 on it is what he proved. Even a Red Sox team. I imagine a Brewers team would be lucky to avoid losing 100 games each week.

The only thing possibly proved was that it is difficult to win with a single franchise themed team at the perfect level. That is different than saying that a themed team, or any team where the owner invested $150, can not be competitive at all.

Almost all of the debate on competitiveness, FTP vs. pay, tanking, etc., consists of issues about the perfect level, where only 25% of the universe of teams are in at any one time, anyway. With OOTP 20, that will drop to 20% with the addition of the iron level.

If the fundamental dynamics of game play work for 80-90% of the teams in the entire universe at any one time, and the only place where the game dynamics break down is when a team becomes mediocre or uncompetitive at the highest level when competing against the best of the best, not sure that is really much of a problem.

[atabakin]

Originally Posted by Mizzery

Almost all of the debate on competitiveness, FTP vs. pay, tanking, etc., consists of issues about the perfect level, where only 25% of the universe of teams are in at any one time, anyway. With OOTP 20, that will drop to 20% with the addition of the iron level.

There are far fewer teams at the perfect level, considering that there are currently five (6 with the upcoming addition of iron) levels and there are fewer perfect leagues than other league levels. We know from the PT Universe screen that there are 13,314 teams currently in the universe. From the same screen we know that there are 19 perfect leagues. There is likely one league at fewer than 30 teams, but for simplicity we can say there are 570 perfect teams (19x30). 570/13,314 = 4.28%

We're talking about a very small group, but the group that will spend most of the money.

[HRBaker]

Whether it be a "reset" button (go back to Bronze and start over) or a "controlled rebuild" option, I think either is better than letting owners either get frustrated and quit, or crash their team affecting everyone else.

[<Pion>]

Originally Posted by HRBaker

Whether it be a "reset" button (go back to Bronze and start over) or a "controlled rebuild" option, I think either is better than letting owners either get frustrated and quit, or crash their team affecting everyone else.

Not that I care what is done either way, but just wondering... Would the people getting angry at being promoted when they shouldn't have been be a problem they would need to learn to live with? One possible outcome is that people would reset more than might be expected because they love the fun of building or opening packs. In theory, if you get your PP back somehow (including those purchased), if a player doesn't like their draw, they can just keep resetting until happy. If there was a reset, it would have to be limited in some way. At least once baseball game on facebook allows resets, but you lose all "game money" (equivalent of PT's PP) if you do. If a team that spent $100 was faced in losing all their PP and starting with just six packs, there would be less resets but still some unhappy campers.

[HRBaker]

Originally Posted by <Pion>

Not that I care what is done either way, but just wondering... Would the people getting angry at being promoted when they shouldn't have been be a problem they would need to learn to live with? One possible outcome is that people would reset more than might be expected because they love the fun of building or opening packs. In theory, if you get your PP back somehow (including those purchased), if a player doesn't like their draw, they can just keep resetting until happy. If there was a reset, it would have to be limited in some way. At least once baseball game on facebook allows resets, but you lose all "game money" (equivalent of PT's PP) if you do. If a team that spent $100 was faced in losing all their PP and starting with just six packs, there would be less resets but still some unhappy campers.

The first thing we all have to realize that that not everyone will be happy if we do something OR not. Ultimately, OOTP has to make any decision - I'm just hoping they are following the discussion so they get all the pros and cons of all the options.

In a "controlled rebuild" situation, I don't think you would have to do anything other than set the limit on what the team "average" can be dropped to. They will sell players, get their PPs from those sales, and opt to spend those points however they wish.

In a "reset" situation, however, it would have to be between seasons (Sunday night) since their team would have to disappear before the servers started reassigning everyone. In this case, the owner would get nothing - simply 6 new packs and their first 1000 points.

Maybe both options should be available.

[<Pion>]

Originally Posted by HRBaker

The first thing we all have to realize that that not everyone will be happy if we do something OR not. Ultimately, OOTP has to make any decision - I'm just hoping they are following the discussion so they get all the pros and cons of all the options.

In a "controlled rebuild" situation, I don't think you would have to do anything other than set the limit on what the team "average" can be dropped to. They will sell players, get their PPs from those sales, and opt to spend those points however they wish.

In a "reset" situation, however, it would have to be between seasons (Sunday night) since their team would have to disappear before the servers started reassigning everyone. In this case, the owner would get nothing - simply 6 new packs and their first 1000 points.

Maybe both options should be available.

I would think they are following the discussion, but as mentioned earlier, this is a discussion that was already had at least once in which their decision, based on the pros and cons brought up, was to not have a reset option. That doesn't mean that they won't change that decision based on further discussion, only that they did listen before and went with what we have. It was also stated in a very "unofficial" way that if the tanking was done in a reasonable sane way, they would essentially look the other way rather than hold them to the ToS (this is my wording of what was said, not a direct quote). The thing is, there are easy ways to lose without doing some of the things reported in this community. For example, if you're doing everything to win and winning only 45%, letting the AI run your team is probably enough to drop you down enough to get demoted (assuming the AI isn't smarter than the manager running the team). If the AI running your team isn't enough to get you demoted, then you probably belong at the level you're at. That being said, the AI is not a solution for the guy that just wants to ultimately start over, but is a way for a team to move down to a level they would be more competitive at.

[pappyzan]

The reset idea is indeed a better option, but there will be unintended consequences associated with it. Guys will find a systematic way to make high amounts of PP in the lower levels and could simply reset their team every year or two over and over for more PP, with the hopes of eventually cashing in on high level players when they're ready to move up to diamond/perfect w/o ever paying a dime. Which is fine with me, I don't care what anybody is doing; just throwing this out there because guys are gonna find exploits no matter what is or isn't done.

[kingcharlesxii]

Originally Posted by pappyzan

The reset idea is indeed a better option, but there will be unintended consequences associated with it. Guys will find a systematic way to make high amounts of PP in the lower levels and could simply reset their team every year or two over and over for more PP, with the hopes of eventually cashing in on high level players when they're ready to move up to diamond/perfect w/o ever paying a dime. Which is fine with me, I don't care what anybody is doing; just throwing this out there because guys are gonna find exploits no matter what is or isn't done.

The way to avoid that is for the reset to make you lose all points that you earned with your team and just start over with whatever a new account would get plus any points you actually purchased.

The exploit there is you could reroll every week trying to get a bomb in your starter packs but that can easily be avoided too with a limited number of resets (either in RL time or in-game years, maybe once a decade). I think it's actually a fairly easily manageable problem.

I know I've gotten really bored with my team that is perpetually at .500 in Diamond because I can't earn enough points to really progress at this point. It would be a problem if 20 wasn't coming so soon.

[pappyzan]

Originally Posted by kingcharlesxii

The way to avoid that is for the reset to make you lose all points that you earned with your team and just start over with whatever a new account would get plus any points you actually purchased.

The exploit there is you could reroll every week trying to get a bomb in your starter packs but that can easily be avoided too with a limited number of resets (either in RL time or in-game years, maybe once a decade). I think it's actually a fairly easily manageable problem.

Yep, both options would be fair enough for players and devs alike.

[CapeCodCranberry]

Originally Posted by <Pion>

I would think they are following the discussion, but as mentioned earlier, this is a discussion that was already had at least once in which their decision, based on the pros and cons brought up, was to not have a reset option. That doesn't mean that they won't change that decision based on further discussion, only that they did listen before and went with what we have. It was also stated in a very "unofficial" way that if the tanking was done in a reasonable sane way, they would essentially look the other way rather than hold them to the ToS (this is my wording of what was said, not a direct quote). The thing is, there are easy ways to lose without doing some of the things reported in this community. For example, if you're doing everything to win and winning only 45%, letting the AI run your team is probably enough to drop you down enough to get demoted (assuming the AI isn't smarter than the manager running the team). If the AI running your team isn't enough to get you demoted, then you probably belong at the level you're at. That being said, the AI is not a solution for the guy that just wants to ultimately start over, but is a way for a team to move down to a level they would be more competitive at.

But thats the thing. I didnt throw a temper tantrum, and immediately blow everything up. I waited 5 seasons, and averaged winning at only 44%. Which in and of itself is fine, but is frustrating to someone who dropped countless hours (as I work from home), and as stated $150, on losing.

That 44% would land me in the bottom 6-12 positions every year. Never enough to actually get demoted. Essentially stuck. As stated many times before me. So what then? Those were essentially my reserve players (as I managed to collect almost all the Red Sox cards). Until my All Time players started to sell, I wasnt recouping any new PP, and at the cost I was getting back vs the cost required of actual upgrades to "compete", there really wasnt much else of a choice. Now had this been in the 7th or 8th season of '20, then yes, stair stepping down mightve been a more thoughtful approach, but not neccessarily one that wouldve accomplished what I, the paying end user, was looking to do. But alas, it was the last two weeks of '19.

PT was my first foray into OOTP, and I hope not the last, as I have learned (other ways) to enjoy the game, but again, as part of the community - that seems mostly outraged at any kind of opinionated "out of line" behavior, what would you do...?

[<Pion>]

Originally Posted by CapeCodCranberry

...what would you do...?

I took advantage of being out of the running for a playoff spot by training some guys in other positions to ultimately improve my team for the following season(s).

[David Watts]

So, if I let my team that was promoted to Gold a couple weeks ago wither into oblivion, am I tanking?

[CapeCodCranberry]

Originally Posted by <Pion>

I took advantage of being out of the running for a playoff spot by training some guys in other positions to ultimately improve my team for the following season(s).

Ok, so you traded defense to keep your offense. Essentially, I traded my offense to keep my defense, no?

And how exactly does "training at other positions" improve your team?

[zrog2000]

Originally Posted by CapeCodCranberry

Ok, so you traded defense to keep your offense. Essentially, I traded my offense to keep my defense, no?

And how exactly does "training at other positions" improve your team?

Well you need backups for every position right? If you can have one player backup 4-6 positions, you have more roster spots to use for platoons.

Also, training a CF to play LF will make it so when you go to upgrade, you can look at either a CF or a LF.

[<Pion>]

Originally Posted by CapeCodCranberry

Ok, so you traded defense to keep your offense. Essentially, I traded my offense to keep my defense, no?

Not sure what you mean by this. I don't see how I traded anything for anything unless you're referring to the temporary reduction in defense while the player is training.

Originally Posted by CapeCodCranberry

And how exactly does "training at other positions" improve your team?

Both guys that I trained ended up as better defenders than the people that had started there. I lost some offense at one position, but that was more than offset by the improvement of the defense. Guys that used to have an ERA of 4.50 to 5.00 are now 3.50 to 4.00.

[<Pion>]

Originally Posted by zrog2000

Well you need backups for every position right? If you can have one player backup 4-6 positions, you have more roster spots to use for platoons.

Also, training a CF to play LF will make it so when you go to upgrade, you can look at either a CF or a LF.

Yes, or in my case having two very good defending SS and training one to play 2B that ends up being better than the previous starter. Though the offense took a hit, the defense made up for it. The other move was to train a tall 3Bman sitting on the bench to play 1B. Ended up improving not only defense but also offense at that position.