Game Counteracting Sliders

[tc020791]

This is something I’ve always felt was there in some sports games. It’s hard to tell though without a serious sample size, especially in something like MLBTS. With that being said I definitely don’t have a big enough sample size but what I’m seeing doesn’t feel like a coincidence. Not to mention, in years past, this exact approach to the sliders worked well. I know a few years back JoshC went with default sliders but USER Pitch Control at 6 because he said it helped the CPU hunt pitches more and be more aggressive. So this has definitely been a thing in the past.

First want preface this by saying I’m playing on HOF Hitting and Legend Pitching. There’s been two major areas in this years game which has me convinced that there is balancing going on under the hood when you change sliders. The first one is errors. On default, I just wasn’t getting enough errors, so I started tweaking the error sliders. Here’s the thing though, with infield and outfield errors at 6, I wasn’t seeing more errors on the scorecard, I was just seeing bad defense. So I settled on just cranking up the infield throwing errors to 9. What I saw over about a 50 game sample size, for just my team, was under 10 throwing errors and no other errors period. So I went back to the drawing board, put all errors back to 5, with one caveat. I turned outfield throwing errors down to 2.I was just seeing way too many off line throws from the outfield, almost never saw an outfield assist. Then out of nowhere I start getting errors I’ve never seen before. Fielding errors, throwing errors, drops on transfers, drops at first base. Seeing all these things I never saw in 50 games, in just a handful of games with outfield throwing errors at 2.

The next part of the game I was having problems with, like many others, is with the CPU not being a threat at the plate. Through 50 games with the Orioles, on default legend pitching, I was top 5 in every single pitching category. Which frankly just isn’t realistic for the Orioles. The numbers weren’t unreasonable, ERA at 3.30, 8.0 K/gm, 2 BB/gm. But the CPU just didn’t feel like much of a threat and were only averaging 0.8 HR/gm. I loathe the fact that I’m hoping the CPU hits a HR off me, it should be the opposite and it just wasn’t happening for me. So I again went to the drawing board and decided to drop USER Pitch Consistency down to 3. Over a small sample size, though the CPU was scoring more runs on a few more hits, their offense somehow felt worse. They were getting a lot of good pitches to hit and were just doing nothing with them. All their runs were coming off of singles and the occasional double and didn’t hit a HR for multiple games, not to mention their K numbers sky rocketed to over 10/gm.

So then I really started thinking about what happened when I messed with the errors, combined with the idea from Josh a few years back. So I put all sliders on default for Legend Pitching, kept outfield throwing errors at 2, and put USER Pitch Control up to 6. It was like a switch was flipped for the CPU. I still need a much, much bigger sample size to confirm this suspicion. But from what I can tell, there has to be some sort of balancing going on under the hood when you change sliders. Baseball is based so much off of averages and numbers. So it feels like when you tilt things in the USERS favor it will try and tilt it back towards the CPU to keep things balanced. The good thing is USER Pitch Control at 6 vs 5 is almost indistinguishable. I well report back after I get a much larger sample size.

[Rmiok222]

Quote: Originally Posted by tc020791

This is something I’ve always felt was there in some sports games. It’s hard to tell though without a serious sample size, especially in something like MLBTS. With that being said I definitely don’t have a big enough sample size but what I’m seeing doesn’t feel like a coincidence. Not to mention, in years past, this exact approach to the sliders worked well. I know a few years back JoshC went with default sliders but USER Pitch Control at 6 because he said it helped the CPU hunt pitches more and be more aggressive. So this has definitely been a thing in the past. First want preface this by saying I’m playing on HOF Hitting and Legend Pitching. There’s been two major areas in this years game which has me convinced that there is balancing going on under the hood when you change sliders. The first one is errors. On default, I just wasn’t getting enough errors, so I started tweaking the error sliders. Here’s the thing though, with infield and outfield errors at 6, I wasn’t seeing more errors on the scorecard, I was just seeing bad defense. So I settled on just cranking up the infield throwing errors to 9. What I saw over about a 50 game sample size, for just my team, was under 10 throwing errors and no other errors period. So I went back to the drawing board, put all errors back to 5, with one caveat. I turned outfield throwing errors down to 2.I was just seeing way too many off line throws from the outfield, almost never saw an outfield assist. Then out of nowhere I start getting errors I’ve never seen before. Fielding errors, throwing errors, drops on transfers, drops at first base. Seeing all these things I never saw in 50 games, in just a handful of games with outfield throwing errors at 2. The next part of the game I was having problems with, like many others, is with the CPU not being a threat at the plate. Through 50 games with the Orioles, on default legend pitching, I was top 5 in every single pitching category. Which frankly just isn’t realistic for the Orioles. The numbers weren’t unreasonable, ERA at 3.30, 8.0 K/gm, 2 BB/gm. But the CPU just didn’t feel like much of a threat and were only averaging 0.8 HR/gm. I loathe the fact that I’m hoping the CPU hits a HR off me, it should be the opposite and it just wasn’t happening for me. So I again went to the drawing board and decided to drop USER Pitch Consistency down to 3. Over a small sample size, though the CPU was scoring more runs on a few more hits, their offense somehow felt worse. They were getting a lot of good pitches to hit and were just doing nothing with them. All their runs were coming off of singles and the occasional double and didn’t hit a HR for multiple games, not to mention their K numbers sky rocketed to over 10/gm. So then I really started thinking about what happened when I messed with the errors, combined with the idea from Josh a few years back. So I put all sliders on default for Legend Pitching, kept outfield throwing errors at 2, and put USER Pitch Control up to 6. It was like a switch was flipped for the CPU. I still need a much, much bigger sample size to confirm this suspicion. But from what I can tell, there has to be some sort of balancing going on under the hood when you change sliders. Baseball is based so much off of averages and numbers. So it feels like when you tilt things in the USERS favor it will try and tilt it back towards the CPU to keep things balanced. The good thing is USER Pitch Control at 6 vs 5 is almost indistinguishable. I well report back after I get a much larger sample size.

First off…….

Screw the ravens.

Secondly. I get what you mean 100%. As much as we despise SDS, EA, or whatever gaming company at times..we have to remember these dudes made the dang game. They know what’s happening under the hood. We really do not. I lived and learned from the mistake of jacking sliders up to 7, 8, 9, 10 etc.

Mainly contact and both pitching sliders are the most sensitive sliders of them all. I try to do as little as possible with those, especially the pitching sliders.

Once you go down the rabbit hole of putting one slider on 9, then another on 8, then another on 10..you wont even know what is doing what at that point.

Not to mention…say for example you have user contact on 9 (nobody does that, just an example) and you score 36 runs in two games just like the cubs did against the reds in real life. After that you’re going to say “wow. My contact slider is too high..better lower this”

So yeah..my point is it just turns into a mess and you’re right. It’s better off keeping things basic because it truly does put the game out of whack and if you mess with things too much it will prevent you from going on hot and cold streaks just like baseball is like in real life.


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[bryanm1982]

The infield errors were like that in 22 as well. You raise errors to get more errors and you get more infield hits.

But my question is, you say raising sliders to 7,8, or 9 could be unbalancing the game. Wouldn’t that be true when you put OF Throwing errors at 2? 2 is just an extreme as 8. Then what would be the difference between 2 and say 0 for throwing errors?

I know Josh always believed that if you used different difficulties for hitting and pitching it could inbalance the game.

[Rmiok222]

Quote: Originally Posted by bryanm1982

The infield errors were like that in 22 as well. You raise errors to get more errors and you get more infield hits. But my question is, you say raising sliders to 7,8, or 9 could be unbalancing the game. Wouldn’t that be true when you put OF Throwing errors at 2? 2 is just an extreme as 8. Then what would be the difference between 2 and say 0 for throwing errors? I know Josh always believed that if you used different difficulties for hitting and pitching it could inbalance the game.

I agree with that too. Seems like some sliders you can get away with extreme values and some you can’t.


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[dowie]

I am not a developer, but I lean towards being in the default slider camp.

General rule of thumb is to never go more than +1 or -1 on any slider.

Baseball is a long season with a lot of ups and downs.
If my sliders are all over the place, I question the results every game I play.

The only sliders I feel (and I could be wrong) are user preference and don't impact balance under-the-hood are pitch speeds (I like those maxed out) and the trade slider (personally I like that at 2 and I move it to 3 in July and Dec).

I recommend default sliders (MLBTS20 is the exception, Armor nailed it with his set).

Dowie

[tc020791]

Quote: Originally Posted by bryanm1982

The infield errors were like that in 22 as well. You raise errors to get more errors and you get more infield hits. But my question is, you say raising sliders to 7,8, or 9 could be unbalancing the game. Wouldn’t that be true when you put OF Throwing errors at 2? 2 is just an extreme as 8. Then what would be the difference between 2 and say 0 for throwing errors? I know Josh always believed that if you used different difficulties for hitting and pitching it could inbalance the game.

I think you missed the point. This isn’t about who’s sliders are the right value and who’s are off, it’s was supposed be about creating a different view point, and seeing if anyone else was seeing anything similar. It was just a conversation about what is going on under the hood, nothing more than that…

[bryanm1982]

Quote: Originally Posted by tc020791

I think you missed the point. This isn’t about who’s sliders are the right value and who’s are off, it’s was supposed be about creating a different view point, and seeing if anyone else was seeing anything similar. It was just a conversation about what is going on under the hood, nothing more than that…

Sorry if it came out that way. It wasn't meant to be defensive it was just a question. I agree that it could be something under the hood. I have tried the error settings you used and I have seen plays that I have not seen before. Even a line drive single to the RF the fielder got it while running and it dropped out of his glove to roll about 3 feet. Not enough to advance the runners so it wasn't an error but it was a nice animation and nice to see that.

I guess what I was trying to say is it is just weird that you see more errors of all kinds by lowering OF Throwing Errors to 2 than you do with all the sliders at 5 or raising them. But at the same time, lowering pitcher consistency doesn't give the same results.

About Outfield Throwing Errors, they must have done something in a patch. A couple of patches ago, the announcers kept saying how bad the relay throw from the OF was on almost all the hits. Then a later patch fixed that. But ever since then, I'm seeing a LOT of errant throws back to the infield. Mostly the fielders miss the cut-off man on an easy single when there isn't any urgency needed. It isn't a game breaker but it is annoying. I think the runners advanced only once or twice. Like I get if they throw to 3rd base or to 2nd and the throw is wide. But I feel like they miss the cut-off man too much.

[tc020791]

Quote: Originally Posted by bryanm1982

Sorry if it came out that way. I agree that it could be something. I have tried the error settings you used and I have seen plays that I have not seen before. Even a line drive single to the RF the fielder got it while running and it dropped out of his glove to roll about 3 feet. Not enough to advance the runners so it wasn't an error but it was a nice animation and nice to see that. I guess what I was trying to say is it is just weird that you see more errors of all kinds by lowering OF Throwing Errors to 2 than you do with all the sliders at 5 or raising them. About Outfield Throwing Errors, they must have done something in a patch. A couple of patches ago, the announcers kept saying how bad the relay throw from the OF was on almost all the hits. Then a later patch fixed that. But ever since then, I'm seeing a LOT of errant throws back to the infield. Mostly the fielders miss the cut-off man on an easy single when there isn't any urgency needed. It isn't a game breaker but it is annoying. I think the runners advanced only once or twice. Like I get if they throw to 3rd base or to 2nd and the throw is wide. But I feel like they miss the cut-off man too much. I

This was exactly why I went with it at 2. Was just seeing way too many miss throws for absolutely no reason. Then when the other errors started coming, it made sense that it was probably because there weren’t as many outfield throwing errors, so the game could be trying to make up for that. I myself have had 4-5 errors in just the last 10 or so games after only having 8 through the first 60 or so with different settings. Also seeing a lot more from the CPU.