Great post. Super informative and helpful.

Look. There’s nothing wrong with being able to hit. The problem is the check swing non-calls and the strikes on corners not being called strikes.

Expand the strike zone that the game umpires actually call strikes, and call it a strike when the batter swings half his body around.

You guys that are holding R2 the entire time your opponent is trying to pitch are really a special kind of bad person.

Maybe learn how to win a game without cheating? You might find it actually feels good.

You are the one that is delaying the game. He is only trying to counter you.

The sportsmanlike thing to do once your opponent sees you are taking an extra step lead and throws over/steps off a few times, is to stop taking an extra step and move your runner with the bat.

Nice flex.

Personally, I don’t see where skill is involved in determining whether an outcome is good squared, good good, perfect, or good ok, but if it makes you feel better about it, sure.

@daelon11 said in I really don’t understand the timing:

It's not the tv. Been using the same system for years. It's the 1.4 patch that screwed things up

You know what else? If a player needs to have a gaming monitor to hit a fastball, the game really should come with a disclaimer.

All the power to you guys who want to get sweaty staring at a monitor up close, but many of us actually want to enjoy just playing the game.

If that makes me “casual” in your eyes, so be it, but ragging on a dude because he wants to play a video game on a tv while sitting on his couch is pretty lame.

It really motivates me to grind through the lower levels, knowing that the reward at the end is even less satisfying gameplay.

It’s not just the pitching. The game creates opportunities for the trailing team.

Not all of us want to play every out of a game against the neon pink uniformed, DJ horn blaring, bunt dancing, quick pitching, up and in fastball spamming tryhards.

Enjoy your easy win if your opponent quits. What’s with the desire to penalize your opponents? They’re already taking a loss.

I don’t understand the “respect” angle.

Are we supposed to serve up hangers? The game does that for us enough as it is.

@yankblan_psn said in Showdown made me uninstall the game (feedback):

@halfbutt_psn said in Showdown made me uninstall the game (feedback):

First, I’m pretty sure all you need to do is beat the first mini mission or two to get your stubs back, so it’s not “all or nothing”.

Second, with all due respect to yankblan, auto-taking to two strikes with every hitter is not universal good advice. If you are going to do that, make sure you have those perks equipped.

Taking pitches is good. Taking good pitches in hitter’s counts is not good.

I did specify using the perks for this strategy; you want to drain the pitcher so that around 10 outs you can start racking up runs. Since it’s on veteran difficulty, swinging with contact gets you hits easily. It’s easier than last year, but last year with checks swings you could stretch ABs to 10+ pitches quite often. It’s not a guaranteed, but when I went into TA boss at 15-15 just attacking the ball with diamond mashers I still lost (I was fuming lol); but with a RP it’s really easy to drain the guy.

Yeah, I’m not disagreeing with you.

I have just found that, for me, I would rather swing early in the count if the pitch is there. I like to equip perks that help that, like “clear for takeoff” etc.

Also, this kind of applies to RS and other H2H online modes. Taking pitches can be good but, at some point, you need to swing in order to hit.

One possibility that nobody seems to like is that your opponent, who couldn’t hit his way out of a paper bag for most of the game, actually starts to make adjustments and better swings.

It happens.

Similarly, your pitching sequences might not be as bulletproof as you thought. Nobody likes to admit their opponent figured them out.

First, I’m pretty sure all you need to do is beat the first mini mission or two to get your stubs back, so it’s not “all or nothing”.

Second, with all due respect to yankblan, auto-taking to two strikes with every hitter is not universal good advice. If you are going to do that, make sure you have those perks equipped.

Taking pitches is good. Taking good pitches in hitter’s counts is not good.

@genopolanco_psn said in concentrating in hitting sinkers and cutters in this game is exhausting:

I was wondering if I was the only one who had 2-seamers get demolished every time I leave one in the zone....

If you leave ANYTHING in the zone, it will get demolished.

@rosborn27_psn said in Unplayable:

Monitor makes a world of difference. So much better to play on and that’s from someone with about as good a TV for gaming (by LG) that you can get.

A monitor will not do anything for your pci placement though. You still need to put the PCI on the ball. Having less input lag obviously is a good thing, but it won’t make you a better hitter if your placement still sucks.

You characters that think you are clever rounding third on a groundball to short are not really helping yourselves to get better.

FWIW, for those of you that haven’t figured it out yet, if you need to do cheesy stuff to get your BR or low division ranked wins, you are just going to make it harder on yourselves later.

/old guy rant.

I really hate to take pitches and work counts on rookie and veteran difficulty, so when I do showdowns, I try to take perks like “clear for takeoff” and others that give me bonus to contact and exit velo early in the count.

There are a lot of ways to beat the showdowns. Find one that suits your play style.

If you’re having trouble with the final bosses, try to complete as many mini-missions as you can so you can go in only down 2-4 runs, or tied if possible.

It can be a very frustrating mode and I’m glad to have got the 4 TA players I needed so I don’t have to grind them more than once per inning.

I sucked at them last year and am about 50/50 this year, so don’t give up!

It’s one of those take it or leave it things. Maybe some sliders got tweaked, maybe not. SDS says no gameplay changes and that they are “happy” with how the game plays rn.

We have no way of really knowing and there’s nothing we can do about it, so I guess it’s pretty simple.

Compared to all the other dumb stuff some players do online, contact swings are fine.

In fact, contact swings are fine regardless. You don’t need to strike out every batter. In fact, ground balls are democratic and keep your pitch count down. Learn to throw strikes that don’t get hit out of the park? Play defense?

Complaining about contact swings is pretty soft, imo.

All good points. A guaranteed mission round makes sense. And yeah, exchanging a sure win for another Sano bomb is not terrible. I mean two bombs is not a ton so the win kinda guarantees you a couple more plate appearances with him at least (or Souza or whoever it is). One more K with Gagne...