Progress and player stats

[justme]

Hi all,

Do you know whether players improve their skills by playing and/or winning? Or will improvements only happen through assignment of staff?
In other words, will that 1B baseman always creep like a snail or is there a way to have him use the backburner?

That leads me to the next question: Which skills are need on which position? Do all of them need fielding and arm or is fielding for the infield and arm for the outfield positions?

Which strategy do you use: Assign the highest staff bonus to the player with the weakest stat or improve your best player to become even better?

Thanks

[Matt]

Only through staff assignment I believe. I'm more than halfway through my season without using modifiers and everyone's stats are the same as they were on Day 1.

Fielding and arm are gonna be important for both IFs and OFs pretty equally I'd imagine (Arm strength less so for 2B and 1B). For IF, higher fielding would mean they'll make more successful leaping catches or dives on ground balls and I think it might also increase the range that they have without having to dive. For instance, my 3B is a poor fielder and misses a lot of grounders just by her, while my 1B scoops them up more often. I might be wrong about this but that's the impression I get from playing.

Catchers would benefit from arm strength to prevent stolen bases but fielding is probably not important at all for them. Speed in the OF is gonna be very important, too.

I'd probably start with shoring up the weakest players first, get rid of any butchers in the field. If you generally get more ground balls than fly balls, it also might be best to focus on IF defense first (and vice versa).

[C. Love]

So a question on progressing players and season mode - if you are progressing your players, is AI doing the same for the rest? Or are you just catching up to the AI and then altering your Ego as you get too strong?

For season mode - when you finihs a season and move onto "season 2" as it were, is it actually a season 2? Or just you carrying over your player upgrades. Are stats carried over?

I am in a quandry with this game as am more of a sports sim guy than arcade player, but still love this game and see the potential if it were to head in that direction.

Are there any baseball sims like that where you play (as a team or just one player) but manage the team through a dynasty mode? I am a South African, so not a traditional baseball fan so any direction here would be great.

[Matt]

Originally posted by Chris Crooks:

So a question on progressing players and season mode - if you are progressing your players, is AI doing the same for the rest? Or are you just catching up to the AI and then altering your Ego as you get too strong?

That's a great question that I thought about myself. Sometimes I look at opposing player cards post-game and it looks like they've got a stat boost applied.

Originally posted by Chris Crooks:

For season mode - when you finihs a season and move onto "season 2" as it were, is it actually a season 2? Or just you carrying over your player upgrades. Are stats carried over?

You just carry over any stat modifiers and whatever Level you've reached through your first season. No stat carry-over.

Are there any baseball sims like that where you play (as a team or just one player) but manage the team through a dynasty mode? I am a South African, so not a traditional baseball fan so any direction here would be great.

If you want to actually play a game of baseball with franchise and My Player modes, MLB 2K12 is the most recent one on PC I believe. Not sold on Steam anymore so you'd have to track down a physical copy somehow.

If you just want to manage the team and not worry about playing games, there's the fantastic Out Of The Park series. I see you've played a ton of Football Manager so I think it would be something you'd enjoy. Super in-depth and detailed management sim.

[C. Love]

Thanks Mate, appreciate the feedback. I played OOTP14 and really enjoyed it once I got my head around some of the intracacies of baseball, found it a tiny bit lifeless but am hearing good things about the '16 iteration. You played that? Interested in your thoughts...

Would love a little more depth in S.M.Baseball i.e. a Dynasty mode with more players, teams, assigned home stadiums (all of which the community could probably help alot with in terms of creating new players/teams/stadiums), as well as free agency, trades, and drafts (which would require player aging and contracts). I fear this will not be the direction these guys go in though.

Online play will probably come first due to public demand, but I would never underestimate the size of the Sports Simulation market, nor the spending power of its gamers. Its another market that could be tapped into (were there a dynasty mode), givign this game a duel opportunity across two monster markets. Anyway thats my two cents worth!!!

[Delphenium]

Originally posted by Insomniac:

Originally posted by Chris Crooks:

So a question on progressing players and season mode - if you are progressing your players, is AI doing the same for the rest? Or are you just catching up to the AI and then altering your Ego as you get too strong?

That's a great question that I thought about myself. Sometimes I look at opposing player cards post-game and it looks like they've got a stat boost applied.

The AI is progressing as well. If you manage your team well, you can get ahead of them however (justifying an Ego increase).

[Matt]

Originally posted by Chris Crooks:

Thanks Mate, appreciate the feedback. I played OOTP14 and really enjoyed it once I got my head around some of the intracacies of baseball, found it a tiny bit lifeless but am hearing good things about the '16 iteration. You played that? Interested in your thoughts...

Haven't given '16 a shot. Did play '15 for a bit and enjoyed it for the most part, but there were some issues that I ran into with how the game handled minor league roster construction (it would ignore my settings/decisions and I'd have to make a ton of manual adjustments on a weekly basis). It all became overwhelming and I got drained pretty quickly. Which is a shame because the game is just so amazingly detailed, but I'd spend way too much time fixing mistakes the computer made for me.

The AI is progressing as well. If you manage your team well, you can get ahead of them however (justifying an Ego increase).

Thanks for confirming this.

[C. Love]

Originally posted by delphenium:

Originally posted by Insomniac:

The AI is progressing as well. If you manage your team well, you can get ahead of them however (justifying an Ego increase).

So if this is the case why am I able to adjust another team myself when customising a team?

[Delphenium]

Originally posted by Chris Crooks:

Originally posted by delphenium:

So if this is the case why am I able to adjust another team myself when customising a team?

When you are choosing a custom configuration for an AI team, only the 'visual' aspect of it will be used. The progression of skills will be managed by the AI teams themselves.

You can make additional team customizations (and assign modifiers / manage staff) for your own usage.