Suggestions for my 1988 League

[pbar25]

I'm just about to get started with my first historical sim with OOTP7, really looking foward to it. This game is unreal compared to the past ones -- as I have not come across something that I needed to do without finding it fairly quickly.

I'm going to start in 1988 with my Cubs, and wanted to see if there was anything more I could add towards my league to make it even better.

The type of league I'm looking to have is one that is highly realistic with regards to actual players, teams, stadiums, & finances. I'm setting it up so players can only be added through free agency or trades -- and all players will start with the actual team they were on, then it's up to those teams to do what they like with them. (obviously, the Cubs will not be getting rid of Palmeiro, Maddux, and Moyer this time!)

1) I imported the rosters from Lahman. Thank you. http://baseball1.com/statistics/

2) I used Gambo's incredible face packs as my pictures for each player. Thanks very much, great work.
http://web.mac.com/sixwilsons/iWeb/O...Facepacks.html

3) I used Justafan's logos and an assortment of others - great work on those.
http://web.mac.com/sixwilsons/iWeb/OOTPMods/Logos.html

4) I then entered in all of the stadium charts/capacity/factors manually within the stadium editor by using Gambo's incredibly well organized Stadium Charts.
http://web.mac.com/sixwilsons/iWeb/O...Ballparks.html

5) And then I added in the pictures for each stadium - day & night - manually by typing in the file name. Pictures once again provided by Gambo:
http://web.mac.com/sixwilsons/iWeb/O...Ballparks.html
amazing work.

6) Then I reset all of the picture coordinates manually with regards to the new pictures.

7) Then I went within the lahman file and found the managers for 1988. I entered in the names and ages of all the managers manually. (had to search for their birthdays)

8) Set the database path to C:/stats (where lahman is located)

9) Fixed team jerseys to my taste.
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*complete coaching & scouting activated
*3 year recalc
*injuries on - low
*trading on - very low/very hard
*automatic import of historical rookies
*AAA league created
*amateur draft disabled
*finances enabled based on market size - owner with last say
*revenue sharing activated
*all historical progessing options activated including modifiers for players and league totals
*allow ghost players
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My concerns :

1) That all of the stadium information that I entered will revert back after the 1988 season.
(edit: Doesn't look like this will be a problem from what I've read)

2) The representation of the Yankees and making sure that over the course of time that they will consistently spend much more money than the rest -- along with the Red Sox, Dodgers, etc.
Can I simply set all the markets to my desired level and this will take care of that? Or am I better off changing their media contracts?
Or will that revert back once simulation commences through the years and I shouldn't bother as the historical updates will keep tabs on this?

(edit : F1 (help) reads like this for it's explanation:
-- historical progessing options --
"uses a set of historical financial data stored in \OOTP Baseball 2007\data\database\financials.txt to realign your league finances after each season with actual historical numbers."
So, it's the league averages that are updated each year - and if I adjust a market size it shouldn't revert back with any update. That seems to be the best way to keep a historical franchise in line with their actual spending habits in the future I suppose.
And it's not a big deal if everybody is getting their crop of actual players each year.

I just don't want the Yankees or BoSox to be forced into trading away some key players in order to stay under an unrealistic budget when I arrive in the late 90's to the present. Maybe that's always possible with trading on - even at 'very low', and I just need to hope that they stay competitive on a consistent basis in order to afford their future talent? If they don't stay competitive and lose a lot of fans, then they don't deserve to spend a lot of money I suppose.)

3) The best way to go about inputing all finances in order to make it highly realistic. Can I go in and enter in the actual previous year's attendence totals anywhere?

(edit: looks like they are already in there, or something close)

[Gambo]

First of all I love the concept and have done this before in the past.

I do have one question though... You state that

"1) That all of the stadium information that I entered will revert back after the 1988 season.
(edit: Doesn't look like this will be a problem from what I've read)"

I thought that if you have the update league structure automatically turned on the game WILL overwrite stadiums each year.

[pbar25]

Originally Posted by Gambo

First of all I love the concept and have done this before in the past.

I do have one question though... You state that

"1) That all of the stadium information that I entered will revert back after the 1988 season.
(edit: Doesn't look like this will be a problem from what I've read)"

I thought that if you have the update league structure automatically turned on the game WILL overwrite stadiums each year.

Dang, I was really hoping that this would not be the case. This is my first league with OOTP7, so I wasn't sure, thanks.

Which checked box however provides for this stadium information to enter the league each year?
You mention the 'automatically adjust league strategy' box =
help (f1) states that this updates the league's settings for stolen bases, pitching tendencies, etc;
that's strategy but not stadium charts : most likely the factors of the stadiums however.

That means that if it is indeed changing each year if edited - is it simply going to randomly generate stadium charts for each stadium on me, or is it going to reset to what it originally loaded for 1988? Or does it only change the factors?

If there is no setting within my historical league in order to keep my edited stadiums from reverting back to default, without having to give up the adjusted league strategy for stolen bases, etc; there must be a file that can be deleted or a line that needs to be erased in order to stop this, right? Or am I better off allowing the different factors to enter for each ballpark if I want more historically accurate stats? Did the stadium factors really ever change?

__________________
update on my league:
I've gone through spring training and the Cardinals traded Tommy Herr to the White Sox for Dan Pasqua. That's definitely not allowed because I saw a couple of Pasqua's homers at Comiskey that year -- so I'm going to need to have trades off for the most part if that's the type of action that comes with 'very low' frequency.

From this point foward I'm going to have a designated trading window for the AI teams. Something like 2 days per month, and maybe 3 days before the deadline; all on 'very low'.
I'm just not fast enough yet with the clicks to have to deal with forcing trades back between teams each time I see a trade that I can't deal with.

The fact that Herr was traded in early of '88 is very cool though. He's just going to have to cross his fingers for 2 days a month though now. I went through about a week and there was a trade every other day, and while I assume that this would slow down once teams got set, I didn't want to chance it.

And the Cubs will not be very active on the trade market themselves, as I was given the choice of Craig Biggio, Roberto Alomar, and an assortment of others by 'shopping around' a 35 year old Jerry Mumphrey. I like the shopping around option, and was going to limit myself to that as my only option. But with those offers, I'm going to limit myself to only being able to shop around players on the same days that the computer gets to trade.

As far as injuries on 'low' setting - outside of Mike Boddicker punching a wall after a fight with his girlfriend (no joke, he's out 5 months), not many major injuries in spring training at all. I'm actually considering moving it up a notch, and must decide before opening day because I don't want to change any major settings such as injuries once the sim is put into motion.


By the way, my league started in December of 1987, instead of January (at least in spirit). Because there is no chance the Cubs are sending Lee Smith over to the Red Sox for Calvin Schiraldi and Al Nipper. That's why I went with this period for them, they got one stinking division title from a team that had Grace, Sandberg, Dunston, Dawson, Palmeiro, Maddux, Moyer, Sutcliffe, & LSmith. It is nearly time to have a historic run to the World Series, and rebuild the Cub Dynasty that never was.

[clamel]

Managers being my question on this.

Since Lahman has the managers in the manager.csv file, but really not full names as I can see.

Isn´t there a way to just import these guys just as players ???

Hm guess we run into problems when players like Pete Rose pops up as player-manager.

Is your way to get correct names the only way just now.
Typing in the correct names "over" the fictional name OOTP has given the managers and coaches. This way one have to keep check when the AI fires a "true" named manager and get another fictional. You then have to step into the editor again to find out who might be the new guy.

How do you think you should work this out mate ???
Love to hear. On my way to set up something similar but starting some years earlier.
My concern is also how to handle Minor Leagues. Like to have full rosters in AAA but I definitely needs to have correct teams in the minor leagues.
Do I have problem with this ???
How about you ?

[blackrussian]

the game does not have a facility for player-managers. so you either have to accept that there will be 2 pete roses around, or have just either pete rose the player or manager. personally, i choose to either have a vacancy and let the AI hire one or fill in another manager myself, fictional or otherwise. also unfortunate is the fact that we cannot manually force players (or retired players to be more specific) into coaching roles. so you end up with duplicates anyway (eg, Frank Robinson).

in terms of minors, the historical research is up to you. ive been working on an early 80's quickstart and wanted a realistic snapshot of the minor league system. Best literature for that are the sporting news yearly's where all the minor leagues are listed along with stats, player register, etc. that way you can see how the divisions are broken down, games played, etc.

things get trickier in terms of minor lg rosters. i like full rosters as well but obviously the lahman import only provides players who have MLB experience. so you end up with a hybrid league that's fleshed out by fictional players. i have taken to adding non-MLB players (ie, career minor leaguers) with whatever demographic info i can find and giving them quick and dirty ratings based on whatever minor league stats i can find.

so its a bit of work to have a full MLB system but if youre into the historical aspect, its worth it.