Not a Good First Impression

[HDGuru33]

So I finally decided to purchase OOTP 14 and I must say I'm not really impressed with the game play. Some of the things that irk me thus far about the game....

1. Number of passed balls/wild pitches -- Had one SP have 3 WP's in one game and a total of 4 for the team in that game. The other thing about WP's is that you can't track it; no where listed in the stats available but of course WAR is.

2. Length in which the SP goes for the opponent. Consistently finding that my opponent will have his SP go 7 or 8 innings despite losing. Rather than having a pinch hitter come up in the 7th inning down a run they continue to run their SP out to the mound and let him make an easy out when he comes to bat. Really makes no sense.

Might seem like bickering over things but for the reviews and the "worlds best baseball simulation" this seems like 2 issues that should not be over looked.

[Tyler87898]

First thing I wanna know, what year does your league take place in?

Second, you can change the wild pitch modifiers (though you'll have to let someone else help you with that. I've never done it.) so that less of them occur, though how many games are you basing your observation on? May just be a small sample size.

Third, to see wild pitches, go to the pitcher's profile, select "pitching stats," then change the view to "expanded pitching stats 2". You will see "WP" or wild pitches.

[Fyrestorm3]

Want to know why OOTP is the "best baseball sim"? Because pretty much every aspect of your game is able to be tweaked to your liking.

Too many Wild Pitches? Turn down the Wild Pitch modifier. Is the AI leaving starters in too long? You can set each team's strategy to "hook" guys earlier.

I don't have my game with me at the moment, so someone else is going to have to tell you exactly where to find those options, but they are there. Don't give up too quickly - OOTP is the best baseball sim money can buy.

[Honorable_Pawn]

Originally Posted by Fyrestorm3

Want to know why OOTP is the "best baseball sim"? Because pretty much every aspect of your game is able to be tweaked to your liking.

Too many Wild Pitches? Turn down the Wild Pitch modifier. Is the AI leaving starters in too long? You can set each team's strategy to "hook" guys earlier.

I don't have my game with me at the moment, so someone else is going to have to tell you exactly where to find those options, but they are there. Don't give up too quickly - OOTP is the best baseball sim money can buy.

Good points.

I just wanted to add to what you have already mentioned about going to each team to adjust the team strategy settings. There is a much simpler method but, perhaps, not as precise as what you suggest.

In the league setting tabs he could increase use of relievers from normal to often or maybe even very often. Also, he could change pinch hit for pitchers from normal to often etc.

There's lots of things that can be adjusted with this game. That's what makes it so great. A one size fits all approach to setting just won't do. Gameplay is as different from 1880 to 1980 to 2080 as apples are to oranges.

Also, if I want to play a league on another planet that has slightly lower barometric pressure and gravity I can accomplish that.

To the OP: It's all about looking under the hood.

[Honorable_Pawn]

oh...


and welcome to the forums. It's a really great community here. I have seen very helpful and knowlegable people bend over backwards to help new users acclimate to the plethora of settings.

I really hope to see you around.

Welcome.

[Fyrestorm3]

Originally Posted by Honorable_Pawn

In the league setting tabs he could increase use of relievers from normal to often or maybe even very often. Also, he could change pinch hit for pitchers from normal to often etc.

I'm honestly not sure why my mind went to Team Strategy before Use of Relievers. OP, try this first - it's a heck of a lot easier.

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by Honorable_Pawn

oh...


and welcome to the forums. It's a really great community here. I have seen very helpful and knowlegable people bend over backwards to help new users acclimate to the plethora of settings.

I really hope to see you around.

Welcome.

So far, I see a very different approach than http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...uining-me.html.

But only one post so far, as well. Does he want help? Or does he want to rave and trash for one reason or another? Is he here to participate or is he here to just dump and run?

Because this game warrants more than a judgment of "Not a Good First Impression." In my opinion, of course.

[Honorable_Pawn]

without question

[Honorable_Pawn]

Originally Posted by Fyrestorm3

I'm honestly not sure why my mind went to Team Strategy before Use of Relievers. OP, try this first - it's a heck of a lot easier.

but...maybe not as precise.

[Le Grande Orange]

Originally Posted by HDGuru33

1. Number of passed balls/wild pitches -- Had one SP have 3 WP's in one game and a total of 4 for the team in that game.

Sample size.

[Eugene Church]

Originally Posted by HDGuru33

So I finally decided to purchase OOTP 14 and I must say I'm not really impressed with the game play. Some of the things that irk me thus far about the game....

1. Number of passed balls/wild pitches -- Had one SP have 3 WP's in one game and a total of 4 for the team in that game. The other thing about WP's is that you can't track it; no where listed in the stats available but of course WAR is.

2. Length in which the SP goes for the opponent. Consistently finding that my opponent will have his SP go 7 or 8 innings despite losing. Rather than having a pinch hitter come up in the 7th inning down a run they continue to run their SP out to the mound and let him make an easy out when he comes to bat. Really makes no sense.

Might seem like bickering over things but for the reviews and the "worlds best baseball simulation" this seems like 2 issues that should not be over looked.

It's a tremendously wonderful game, but it has its flaws. It will drive a perfectionist out of his mind until he just accepts the game's shortcomings.

It took me a while to learn this.

To really enjoy the game you have to run test leagues to set your team stats the way you want them... the modifiers allow you to do this.

Still the game will do things that you will just have to learn to accept. It will pull a pitcher going into the ninth with a no-hitter or a 10-run lead... pinchhit a lesser hitter for a great hitter just to satisfy the righty-lefty strategy... has some scoring errors that don't ever seem to be fixed... for some strange reason, bats a slow-running catcher second in the lineup... rests great players in the playoffs... even in single-game playoffs or seventh games of the series.

Stick with it and accept the things only Markus can change.

He will eventually get around to fixing a lot of the irritations in the game.

There is no better computer baseball game than OOTPB.

[Gil Thorp]

Hey Eugene, how you been doing? OOtP is simply hands down the best baseball simulation game on the market. Before you start messing with any settings just play out some more games and see what happens. If you're still not satisfied with the results post more info on what type of league you have and how you set it up etc. Welcome aboard

[HDGuru33]

Guys I'm an old school OOTP guy; meaning OOTP 6.5 being one of my favorites. Yes this is far more in depth and a wonderful sim game that offers you more data than you could ever imagine or need.

First yes I completely understand that I can go to each pitcher and look at the wild pitches; however I'm not going to go through my roster to count the total number of wild pitches thrown through the first 20 games of my season.

So by saying 20 games into my season that will give you sample size. I didn't realize there needed to be x number of games played before I'm allowed to pass judgement that based on being a baseball fan I know when there are too many wild pitches being thrown in a sim game compared to what is reality.

I appreciate the feedback on how to adjust the settings and will take a look at that.

I'm not here to trash the game; I paid my $39.99 and every version of OOTP has had its quirks and bugs otherwise there wouldn't be patches and updated versions. No matter how many hours were put into this program there would always be something that would make someone unhappy. I was not attacking rather pointing out a couple things that were rather obvious and to me as having played OOTP for years would like to point out because there are people who have not played OOTP before and would not take the time to go to a forum but rather stop playing the game and perhaps never purchase another version of OOTP based on the initial settings the league is set at.

To answer the final question my league is set for the start of the 2013 season.

[The Wolf]

Out of the Park Baseball Manual

This is the page on changing the engine settings.

[HDGuru33]

Sorry allow me to clarify; 17 game sample size with 16 wild pitches in those games.

[RchW]

Originally Posted by HDGuru33

Sorry allow me to clarify; 17 game sample size with 16 wild pitches in those games.

Compared to current MLB stats you had less than 4 more WP in that 17 game sample. Explain to me again how you know this isn't realistic? I can bet there are some 17 game samples IRL this year that have 16 or more WP. I'll also bet that there are some 17 game samples IRL this year that have 8 WP or less. Should someone who sees 8 WP in a 17 game sample also be disappointed in the game?

[The Wolf]

LGO is correct. Small sample size.

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by HDGuru33

I'm not here to trash the game; I paid my $39.99 and every version of OOTP has had its quirks and bugs otherwise there wouldn't be patches and updated versions. No matter how many hours were put into this program there would always be something that would make someone unhappy. I was not attacking rather pointing out a couple things that were rather obvious and to me as having played OOTP for years would like to point out because there are people who have not played OOTP before and would not take the time to go to a forum but rather stop playing the game and perhaps never purchase another version of OOTP based on the initial settings the league is set at.

Thanks for this, not that you have to explain yourself to us of course. It's just that some of us got burned (actually, we burned each other over nonsense) in that earlier thread that I alluded to above.

Regarding your observation, I think you may be on to something; do a search of the OOTP14 forums and you may find similar threads complaining about too many WP, PB, and balks. On the other hand, see if these do settle down over the course of an entire season as the program seeks to migrate to the established norms for such statistics in the modern era.

[Le Grande Orange]

According to Baseball-Reference, there were a total of 1542 wild pitches in the 2012 MLB season. It ranged from a high of 94 for Colorado to a low of 30 for Philadelphia; the average was 51.4; the median, 50.5. With 2,430 games played, that works out to about 0.63 wild pitches per game.

In terms of individual pitchers, Lincecum had 17 wild pitches in 2012; Jimenez, 16; Masterson, 14; Hernandez and Kuroda both had 13.

Unfortunately, BB-Ref's game logs for pitchers don't list wild pitches so there's no way to see exactly how Lincecum or the other pitchers' wild pitches were distributed amongst their games pitched.

[CatKnight]

HDGuru: I can understand being frustrated when you're told 'small sample size', but in a game like baseball it's true. That's why certain stats like batting average and ERA have a minimum threshold to qualify.

As of today, Miguel Cabrera has the highest qualifying BA at .364. Well, Yasiel Puig of the Dodgers is batting .440...in 109 AB. Small size.

I remember a game set in...I want to say 1970. Through April it seemed like half the league's batters went on hot streaks. Forget needing a DH: Several batters put up numbers like it was 2001. I thought they'd beat Barry Bonds' 73 HR, forget Roger Maris' 61.

They didn't. The league calmed down. Numbers were still a little high over 1970 by the end of the year, but no records fell and nothing looked unpalatable.

I'd say give it a little longer. Another thing you could do is start a separate league with the same settings you're using for this one, and just let the AI run it through a full season, then compare those total figures with that year (or in a modern campaign with 2012's figures). You can find WP stats broken down by team and totaled by subleague under (League)/Stats and Leaders/Team Stats/Team Pitching Stats