Let’s be honest
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@yankblan_PSN that's true but like you said the game is hard enough. If the hitting engine was the same as last year or the year prior the game would be fantastic. Not saying to change much.
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@yankblan_PSN said in Let’s be honest:
@GoozeFn_PSN said in Let’s be honest:
@Ditka06_MLBTS I’d bet they tune it back because several of the streamers are crying about it and they are the only people SDS listens too.
Skeptical of this; it’s the same argument as people saying they only listen to the elite players.
They’re trying to have as wide a base as possible; listening to 4-5 losers on YT is not doing that.
If anything, the way they give out online rewards like candy in MP compared to previous years accomplishes that.
If they are trying to appeal to as wide of a base as possible they are failing in their approach.
For example, offline grinders are definitely a presence in Diamond Dynasty, regardless of the people that think archaically and want to say its a PvP mode. Some of us even spend! Not as much as online players (but realistically even most online players are NMS, or close to it), but its still more $$
But the people that prefer online play often don't want to grind offline for long periods of time...thats fair. The last two years the trend has been to make programs trivial to complete. The recent lightning program took me 5 conquest games, and I was using timing (not even directional) to do so. If I used zone I bet I would have had it done in 3.
So a portion of the playerbase is happy, and thats good. But they didnt even try to balance it. they left grinders with nothing to grind for.
There are plenty of solutions: why not have some kind of time consuming offline track for optional rewards, like premier/ultra packs (NOT those crappy deluxes) and a 50 bundle like they do for online? Why not give some grind heavy, but sellable cards that are on the same level as Ranked/BR cards? that would add to overall spending, not reduce it, as online players might want to spend stubs on those cards if they made them actually valuable.
TA used to fill the void for large chunks of time, but they tinkered with that and it hasnt worked out
As a result I am strongly considering sitting out 26 until the game is given away for free for PS Plus late in the year and just playing 23 for my baseball fix. I expect they will start catering to offline grinders less and less each year, which is the trend for DD/UT/MT modes.
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@creeder21_MLBTS There were definitely some complaining about Shield Woods, but that was more of a mixed bag. There is zero lineup diversity this year because of a complete lack of usable captains.
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@Ditka06_MLBTS I’m not saying it’s realistic. I’m saying I would prefer it to be more realistic. I also understand that I am probably in the minority on this issue. There clearly needs to be a balance and I think that is what they are attempting this year.
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@Ditka06_MLBTS Not arguing your point of view, but last year people complained too, and the same complaints for the last 5 years (PP not being a hit, late/early HRs, bloops, foul ball galore, etc). I don’t remember a year when the hitting was “good” or “great” based on people’s posts, so I take it with a grain of salt.
This year is unique in the sense that deflated elevation has had a major impact for some players (I don’t care either way) and the defense has been turned up a good bit (annoying for sure, especially the 1B doing its cat-like stretch before the ball is even close and the constant 4-6-3 double plays).
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@yankblan_PSN I would be less critical of captains being restricted to theme teams if they were actually competitive. I’m not even saying theme teams should be optimal, but we shouldn’t be at a massive disadvantage running a theme team. Most teams do not have a competitive theme team. The ones that should, have a worthless boost and still aren’t competitive because of that. They have completely fumbled captains this year and continue to do a poor job of distributing players for every team. There are 4 teams that still don’t even have a 98+.
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@GoozeFn_PSN yeah, last year the lineup diversity was much better, this year you see WAY more META lineups. I honestly don’t care what cards people use or what stadiums they choose to play in. I never quit a game because of the stadium an opponent chooses because I always feel like I’m going to win, or at least have a good chance at winning.
They definitely attempted to balance things this year, but the problem with that attempt, is their hitting engine along with the card attributes doesn’t allow that to actually work well. It now relies way too heavy on RNG whereas before user input was a more prominent factor. In order for user input to be a more prominent factor the game is just going to give up more home runs. And to be honest with you, to me it isn’t just about hitting nukes (I mean I REALLY enjoy hitting nukes), but about getting rewarded for good swings. In the past that reward definitely came in the form of home runs, they attempted to change that this year and I don’t like the outcome of the game play.
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@Teak2112_MLBTS should have specified when making it appealing to as wide a base as possible, I mean making online accessible to more people: rewind packs for WS and BR, Events being a stat grind mode, and Ranked a stat grind/volume driven reward track. What used to be unattainable to most mortals are now in Chase Packs.
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@GoozeFn_PSN I think most people would like cards to be “themable” for all of a player’s former teams. Make it a 10% boost for the team on the card and 5% for off-team cards.
Let’s say I run a Mets theme, Lindor Mets card would get a 10% boost and Cleveland card a 5% boost. He would also count as a Met for the various thresholds.
It could be for captains and also for PXP (maybe at 50% rate?).
The Pirates could be more competitive. Although I don’t know if all that additional coding would lead to more glitches.
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@yankblan_PSN said in Let’s be honest:
@Teak2112_MLBTS should have specified when making it appealing to as wide a base as possible, I mean making online accessible to more people: rewind packs for WS and BR, Events being a stat grind mode, and Ranked a stat grind/volume driven reward track. What used to be unattainable to most mortals are now in Chase Packs.
They made the stat grind a bit too heavy for the time period. 200 hits in 4 weeks is just idiotic
But yes, the cards are cheaper for sure to buy. All my stubs in 2023 went to buying event cards. this year those dont even exist.
I miss BR, while it was a slog to get through the program it was great using a mix of players and not just 99s at every position. And the henchman are a fun part of The Show lore.
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@Teak2112_MLBTS said in Let’s be honest:
@yankblan_PSN said in Let’s be honest:
@Teak2112_MLBTS should have specified when making it appealing to as wide a base as possible, I mean making online accessible to more people: rewind packs for WS and BR, Events being a stat grind mode, and Ranked a stat grind/volume driven reward track. What used to be unattainable to most mortals are now in Chase Packs.
They made the stat grind a bit too heavy for the time period. 200 hits in 4 weeks is just idiotic
But yes, the cards are cheaper for sure to buy. All my stubs in 2023 went to buying event cards. this year those dont even exist.
I miss BR, while it was a slog to get through the program it was great using a mix of players and not just 99s at every position. And the henchman are a fun part of The Show lore.
Flipping however is a lot harder because of the bots, but thats another rant that I could go on.
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@yankblan_PSN said in Let’s be honest:
@GoozeFn_PSN I think most people would like cards to be “themable” for all of a player’s former teams. Make it a 10% boost for the team on the card and 5% for off-team cards.
Let’s say I run a Mets theme, Lindor Mets card would get a 10% boost and Cleveland card a 5% boost. He would also count as a Met for the various thresholds.
It could be for captains and also for PXP (maybe at 50% rate?).
The Pirates could be more competitive. Although I don’t know if all that additional coding would lead to more glitches.
I am the minority but I like the team specific cards, but they need to release 2023 volume of cards for it to work (and not restrict sets obviously).
My only issue with the suggestion here (which overall I like), is I don't think the Mets should be able to use a 99 Willie Mays. But a 99 Rickey Henderson isnt far off the level he played for them and I would LOVE a Mets Rickey.
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Just want to make one point, and if I thought SDS would listen, I would direct it to them since it pertains to them. That said, too often coders in video games make a strategic mistake. They try to replicate the circadian rhythm of people, and the primary point in this thread illustrates that flaw.
Shrinking the size of the PCI is a flawed application of code. It ignores the human element of what is present the whole time -- a human manipulating a control pad. Sometimes, that person has got all the elements at peak form and other times not so much.
What too many coders do is try to create a game where the artificial ebbs and flows derived from computer code -- that make perfect sense when trying to manipulate how a CPU plays out a game -- are then wrongly applied to a human enacted element.
This is the same flaw introduced a few years back and it took three years for SDS to finally tweak the code to fix it. What the problem was is that a double delay was introduced into base stealing. There was the natural delay between the human recognizing the pitcher's initial pitch move and applying the stick command, and then the delay from initial stick command to the virtual player going on the pitch. The coders used that delay in stick command and player's initial run to enact what SDS termed the base stealing attribute. The lower that attribute, the more that delay would be.
The result was base stealing became darn near impossible even with the best running and stealing attributes. What the coders lost sight of is that there should have been zero delay between stick command and the runner going. All the delay needed was the human's ability to see the pitcher move and then go.
Reducing the size of the PCI is a coder's clumsy attempt to replicate circadian rhythm in a human, which is flawed because the human himself applies that naturally. It makes sense to apply such methods to a CPU derived play, but not to a human derived play.
The size of the PCI, just like the delay between stick command to steal and the virtual player's attempt, are examples of bad code. You apply those artificialities to what the CPU players do, not to what the human does.
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The hitting engine is almost the exact same as last year, what they changed is fewer high elevation stadiums and marginally less distance on home runs. Also, I think the PCI shrinkage is ridiculous. It is literally impossible to hit an outside slider on legend because the PCI shrinks so much on legend that the ball is bigger than the inner PCI.
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An outside slider's whiff rate should be determined by player reaction. I think its fair for contact quality to be lessened for a pull hitter on an outside to better replicate baseball, but its also not particularly good for balance and shouldn't be in the game. Especially as dotting pitches is a bit too easy compared to how baseball actually plays (and we all get frustrated when the ball goes outside of the PCI even though its realistic for it to happen from time to time). Its okay to make some sacrifices for the sake of better gameplay, which is exactly why pitches more than half off the black are balls (usually anyway....)
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@PriorFir4383355_XBL they have to to some degree; but your baserunning example is indeed correct. Even the holding and releasing of R2 is using attributes which it shouldn’t. The auto one, yes the attributes should matter, maybe not to the extreme it is now.
But the shrinking of the PCI is trying to reduce the extreme amount of foul balls. How successful or the how it is implemented can be debated for sure. The objective is not necessarily wrong.
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I don't think player input should allow a poor base stealer to get a great jump every time. Actual player weaknesses absolutely need to be reflected in how the card plays.
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@yankblan_PSN I love this idea. It would really make theme teams a lot more competitive and would really help lineup diversity.
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@yankblan_PSN I would love to see a separate themed ranked where you have to use a full theme team, but I have zero faith in their ability to distribute cards evenly enough to make it work, so we’d just see everyone using a handful of the best teams.
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@GoozeFn_PSN ok fine can they at least fix the connection issues, or turn down the pitching sliders a little. So i can stop seeing a 120mph fast balls that are impossible to catch up to. How about that? Ill take that. Oh and the pci shrinkage to same side hitters.
