It's interesting to me that people describe the addition of more random chance as the game being "dumbed down," or in any number of ways that suggest that making it a factor in outcomes has somehow "broken" the game. Considering how outcomes in the real game of baseball depend more on random chance than any other sport, this, to me, makes it feel more real.

I don't want to denigrate the OP (your post is well written and well thought out) or anyone else who feels that all video games should strive to have results determined 100% by input-based skill, as that's obviously the reigning sentiment of those who write in these forums, but that certainly isn't how most people feel. I'd venture to guess that most people who buy this game don't think like that; they want to enjoy a simulated baseball experience where, on any given day, a little bit of luck may allow them to beat a far superior opponent.

I've been playing this game ever since it was a thing, religiously, and this year, with the pandemic conditions and a super fun neck dissection that gave me far too much time to play video games, I've logged thousands of hours over the years. I say that only to make the point that I'm not a "casual" player, and, with that, if I were to posit a theory as to what has "broken" this game, it would be the introduction of the reticle and the resulting mindset that "skill" must trump all else. By allowing users to line up the ball in crosshairs, it has introduced the feeling that successfully accomplishing that should result in a hard base hit at the very least, probably a home run, and anything undesirable is interpreted as the user not being "rewarded" appropriately. Granted, lining it up is very difficult to do, but not so difficult that it doesn't produce very unrealistic results with regard to frequency of hits and, in particular, home runs. The only way to tamp that down is to negate it through RNG, which clearly drives people mad.

Personally, with regard to the reticle, I say just get rid of the [censored] thing, already. If showing how "skilled" you are at lining up your crosshairs on a target is that important to you, play Call of Duty or some other FPS, because that's where that skill belongs. It doesn't have any place in a baseball game (ever used a bat with a scope on it, or know anyone who has?), and working around the mistake of its introduction has resulted in all kinds of weirdness to make the rest of the game work around it.

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