Community Forum

There’s just nothing fun about it any longer. The grinding is all tedious and constantly repeated. The conquest is brutally repetitive. The programs are all the same thing over and over.

The pitching is far too easy to control, making virtually anyone capable of giving up only a fluke homer here and there but otherwise dominating most offenses, especially at mid levels of RS.

And the hitting is next to impossible when guys can constantly dot corners and edges with ridiculous breaking balls and impossibly quick fastballs, and I’m on a 1ms response monitor.

And when you do get a good contact, the fielders can now make ridiculous diving plays consistently.

Addiction is a hard thing to break, we come back again and again to play a game that drives us crazy and largely wastes our time, we have become insane because of it.

This game is the only thing I complain about in life. It makes me a worse person. I’ve been playing for so many years that it’s a tough thing to break, I want to so badly. The past two years especially have truly sucked for the show franchise. It has never felt worse.

The full extent of my addiction became recognizable when the realization hit me that I may not be able to play MLB tonight because of PSN's server and I became a bit irritated for a hot second there...

And of all nights, the one night where baseball was to be the escape from all the political garbage going down.

Seriously, what am I going to do for the next 5 hours now? I may have to read a book... holy cow.

I didn't even know what it was called until I started searching on here, but it has happened to all of us, and we have all be robbed of legitimate counting stats which are used to measure our skill and ability, and when this happens, stats become inaccurate.

The solution is simple... 8 hour ban first time offense, 24 hour ban for each successive offense. Problem solved permanently. SDS, please implement a solution and put an end to this absurd immature behavior.

Real men know how to win and lose graciously.

Only stone-cold losers quit (while a ball is mid-flight) when their weak ego is bruised in a meaningless video game.

When I play Conquest, I generally jump from one team stronghold to the next, then once I’ve defeated them all, I have to go back and capture all the other hexes, including simming every other hex occupied by a stronghold-less team. This can consume 15-30 minutes of my allotted gaming time, which I consider wasted because I’m not able to play or be in the market. Considering this is a foregone conclusion, can there be an option added that once all strongholds are defeated, the entire board is cleared, any hidden packs rewarded, and just be done with it?

(excerpted from CBS Sports Matt Snyder story)

When Allen was on the field, his peak was as good as anyone in baseball. That's not an overstatement. Allen's prime was 1964-74, a span during which he hit .299/.386/.554, good for a 165 OPS+. Those trailing Allen include Willie McCovey, Frank Robinson, Willie Stargell, Roberto Clemente, Willie Mays, Harmon Killebrew, Carl Yastrzemski and we'll just stop there. You get the idea.

Allen's 162-game averages in those 11 seasons were 31 doubles, nine triples, 35 homers, 107 RBI, 106 runs and 12 steals.

Allen wasn't just all over the leaderboards, he topped them. He led the league in runs once, triples once, home runs twice, RBI once, walks once, on-base percentage twice, slugging percentage three times, OPS four times, OPS+ three times, extra-base hits three times, times on base once and position-player WAR once.

Injuries and personal issues are the culprits [for cutting into his playing time], but there's necessary context behind the personal issues -- which led to Allen being labeled a malcontent or worse -- and that would be his enduring of horrible racism (some of which is outlined pretty well by Jay Jaffe in "The Cooperstown Casebook," pages 212-222).

Oh, and by the way, OPS+ adjusts for ballpark and era and Allen sits 19th all-time, tied with Frank Thomas and Willie Mays. He's ahead of Joe DiMaggio, Mel Ott, Aaron, Robinson and a litany of some of the very best hitters ever (the top five is Babe Ruth, Ted Williams, Barry Bonds, Lou Gehrig and Mike Trout, for those curious).

This is absolutely a peak Hall of Famer.

Baseball is all about patience and how well you deal with failure. Since you're playing the role of every player on the team, there's a lot of failure to go around between pitching and hitting. You are guaranteed to make an out 27 times in a game, and you will probably be lit up for at least 4-6 runs a game on average. Accepting this is the first step. You must be able to hit off-speed pitches and the only way this happens outside of luck hits is with patience and practice. You have to start your swing later. I like to hit off the slider, in other words, I look for the slider (or mid-range speed pitch if the guy doesn't have a slider) on nearly every pitch. When it comes and it's in my hitting zone, I'm ready. When I get a fastball, I can speed up my swing, and when it's a slower offspeed, I can delay longer. If I'm in a fastball count, 2-0 or 3-1, I look for it. Players who stink can usually only hit fastballs with any consistency because they are swinging for a fastball on every pitch, so the adjustment to delay the swing is very difficult when you're starting your swing so early. Also, if you're not using a monitor with a 1 ms response time, the game is extremely difficult and virtually impossible to ever become an above-average player. Nearly every other game you can get away with much higher response time, but baseball requires precision. Not a fan of directional hitting and I cannot do PCI. I'm consistently capped around 700 in DD, I think the PCI swing is a necessity to get to WS level and I'll never be able to do it but I still play good baseball. I like pure analog using the flick of the right stick. This allows you to focus entirely on getting a good pitch to hit and your swing timing. Best way to get better is to practice hitting off-speed pitches by trying to only hit them and taking the heaters and sinkers. Watch the pitcher, not the strike zone, and try to pick up the pitch out of their hand by watching their arm action.

I did not mean anything I said in an offensive way, it was entirely about truth, however, point taken, I do not know anyone's financial matters and that could very well have something to do with it, and if it is indeed the case that someone could not play online because of financial constraints, I understand and my comment was insensitive. If it's not the case, however, and someone is too scared of putting themselves out there, so to speak, and fearful of the possibility of suffering a loss (and I am certain this is the case with many on here, I see the frequency of plug pulling that goes on, often mid-flight of a home run), all the more reason to play online and figure out how to overcome adversity. Baseball is a game that subtly teaches many of life's most important lessons, but the only way to learn them is to experience all elements of the game, and one can only get that experience playing against other humans.

I just finished, 25-24 was my final record... it was actually an excellent challenge, extraordinarily difficult, and there are very few weak players attempting it, most opponents had winning records in RS around .600 or better. I'll bet my batting average was around .200 for the 49 games, probably hit 30 HR. Highest scoring game was a 5-3 loss after leading 3-0.

One thing this event did is revealed to me who the best pitchers in this game are. Lamet is extremely good. Degrom is sick but I'd rather face him than Lamet. And Gibson might be the best of them all. Fingers is a fantastic and tricky reliever, as well as Devin Williams, his change is filthy.

My best suggestion: Put out the best defense possible at every position, throw mostly strikes and a healthy dose of high FB's with all pitchers. I also recommend stealing 2nd almost every opportunity you get when you have 85 or higher speed except with Mays, who is terrible at baserunning, and I would attempt to steal 3rd with no outs if you can get the jump on the pitcher.

As for batting... if you're just flailing away, you have no plan, it's going to be hard to luck into hits, you must have a plan. You're never going to catch up to a FB if you're not looking for it. And you're going to be early on every off-speed if you're looking for a FB on every pitch. I think it's better to sit on off-speed and hope to foul off the FB's. Unless your opponent is jamming heaters down the middle of the plate on every first pitch, I think the 0-0 should always be a take. Let's you see a pitch and slow down the AB a little. Don't let a guy quick pitch you, especially with a runner on, slow them down with R1. The games go quickly even if you drag them out an extra couple minutes to allow yourself that extra couple seconds before every high-leverage pitch to get set.

This is the year of the pitcher like never before it seems like. It is far too easy to paint corners and edges consistently, and there are so many players who can’t hit a lick as a result of this. Walk rates are at all time lows. Control needs to be reduced. As does velocity… no pitcher fires off 70 fastballs at 101-102 a game. Pitching needs to be more realistic, as does hitting.

The other thing that SDS should fix is the ability to balk repeatedly. The solution is simple, once a pitch is selected, the pitcher comes to the set, then the player executes the pitch. This gives the base runners time to get set. Right now, I can only slow them down by holding R2. I do it religiously, it’s annoying for sure, but it’s the only way to stop pitchers from balking.

After playing ‘22 for a few hours, I think one of the best and most obvious changes made was fixing pitcher stamina. When a pitcher throws a pitch with all his might, it runs down the meter much quicker. A reliever who comes in and fires FB’s at 102 constantly will be completely worn out within 6-8 pitches and will have to face the second/third batters with almost no stamina. The adjustment will be throwing lower quality pitches. Very fond of this change.

It is a mental illness actually. It’s a form of bullying, I can’t have something so neither can you. The fear of failure is not relieved from it, as it does not deny the failure itself, rather it is a coping mechanism. Anyone who does anything in a rage is taking things way too seriously. It’s just a game. Every single game will have a winner and a loser, no one wins them all, and everyone gets whipped some games, it’s fine to quit, but lose like a man, not a bully, who is inherently a wimp deep down.

Who is your ace SP who you would turn to with the championship on the line? Why him?

CAP (balanced w/ diamond equipment, switch hitter) is still best option at C IMO. Any speedy team can run wild against Piazza. D'Arnaud is much better against RHP than CAP, but CAP is better against LHP, better fielder and much quicker getting around the bases (70 v 47). And the balance to the line up a switch hitter brings is worth quite a bit over another righty.

I think it will suck if they add the DH to the line up. The batting P adds so much strategy to the game that would be a shame to lose.

I would really like to know my catcher's defensive stats, particularly their ability to control the running game... Can you please add the stats for catchers: caught stealing and stolen bases against, and maybe CS%.

Also, can pitcher pick-off's be recorded as well?

I feel like if the players themselves are so well defined by their ratings, then more statistics which would allow the gamer a more complete understanding of his players should be incorporated. Sure, not everyone gets deep into statistics, but for those who do, might as well make a more thorough accounting available.

If I am somehow mistaken and any of these stats are actually kept, please show me the secret to finding them. If they are not, who else agrees and thinks they would be a welcome (and relatively simple for SDS) addition to the 2021 game?

Absolutely not.

Rare cards should exist.

I also like that the market is capped at 1 mil, which makes the rare cards virtually impossible to obtain at this point. This minimizes the pay-for-play aspect of the game.

You just said it right there... conquest has been the same forever. Tell me, once you crack the simple formula to defeating it, isn’t everything outside of playing the games themselves just a tedious exercise? And once all the games are done, is it not the biggest waste of time you can think of having to go through and sim every single hex? It’s not that it doesn’t suit a few players, it’s straight-up a complete waste of time.

@hikes83_psn said in Conquest: SDS Request:

Isn’t it a foregone conclusion that you’ll beat those moments on rookie? Maybe they should just hand you out the free cards while we’re at it

You are confused as to what defines a foregone conclusion.

There is no gameplay or skill involved at the point in which I’m suggesting the ability to sim all remaining games at once.

Allegations do not mean guilt. The legal system considers him innocent until proven guilty. He claims his innocence. Its a he said/she said case. I take him at his word.