Community Forum

No, the worst is actually when you get up 2 strikes. Dot your pitch on the black 3 times and get check swings that obviously fooled your opponent and they're all called balls. Then they foul off a couple until they draw a walk or get a blooper and then hit a HR with the next batter on a pitch away that they pull for a no doubt HR. Follow it up the next inning when you're hitting and get a perfect/perfect fly out to the warning track with Soto or Griffey.

Pitch location should absolutely, 100% of the time be user input based. The argument that it would take away the b/9 and control ratings isn't valid. That's up to the game developers to make pitching harder. Make the targets we have to hit smaller/bigger based on b/9. Make the meters move faster/slower based on control. If those aren't options, think outside the box. RNG based pitching is the easy out way of saying b/9 and control matter. On top of that, if they want it to be so RNG based, then things for hitting have to be tweaked. Pitches on the black, have to be called strikes and swings where the PCI isn't touching the ball should always be whiffs, no exceptions. At least doing that shortens some AB's and doesn't give the hitter an excess amount of chances to get a random hanger, and don't even get me started on check swings. No MLB player can check swing at 4 pitches and not get rung up. Home plate or 1b ump is punching that guy out on principle after 2 check swings.

I'd like to say thank you (genuinely) to SDS and the team for incorporating the Louisville Slugger Autism Speaks bat into the game this year. My daughter was diagnosed with autism 2 years ago and I try to talk with people about it whenever I can. My created team is themed around autism awareness and the bat is perfect to go with that theme. So, from one appreciative parent who loves baseball, tip of the cap to you SDS.

How about fixing pitching? The randomness of pitching has made things even worse. Go back and play MLB 17 or even 18 and see how many times you hit your spot and the pitch goes middle middle or hangs up a ton when you’re throwing below the zone. Hitting will always be somewhat random, but pitching should be 100% user input based as far as pitches going to the location you’re throwing to.

I've had Judge who is a diamond (90+ fielding rating) have 5 missed catches because he doesn't lock onto the ball or because he gets the animation where he's camped under it but starts looking around like he can't find it and it falls behind him. Infielders have way too many errors as well. I don't understand how this game has the same problems at the beginning of every single year.

@Maverick31762 said in Randomized hitting.:

@DanTheThriller said in Randomized hitting.:

@theu715 said in Randomized hitting.:

How about fixing pitching? The randomness of pitching has made things even worse. Go back and play MLB 17 or even 18 and see how many times you hit your spot and the pitch goes middle middle or hangs up a ton when you’re throwing below the zone. Hitting will always be somewhat random, but pitching should be 100% user input based as far as pitches going to the location you’re throwing to.

Yeah, I've lost A LOT of games to a perfect pitches completely missing their spot: how do we account for doing everything right and RNG taking over?

1. Baseball has more chance elements than other sports
2. Player ratings impact outcomes in conjunction with user input
3. Pitchers missing spots isn’t always a function of mechanics.
4. Pitch confidence is real. If you have low pitch confidence and you throw a pitch bad things happen. Regardless of player ratings and user input.
5. There are elements of hitting that arent acuratwly captures in the hitting mechanic.

6. While everything you said is true. It’s also obvious that this game just forces meatballs, hangers, and pitches to completely miss the location.

7. If I hit my target perfectly, the pitch should go where I was aiming every single time.

Seriously though, the game is just too random.

Pitching is so jacked up this year. Even last year when they started moving towards more of the RNG pitching inputs, I could figure out where I needed to release the ball as far as early/late or left/right of the release points (analog) to get the ball to go where I wanted to. This year it's totally random. One game FOTF Oriel is dotting everything where I throw it. Next game my inputs don't matter, he simply is going to hang 6-10 meatballs. It's super frustrating, especially against when that's the only reason your opponent hangs in games.

@ComebackLogic said in One thing I miss from older mlbts games:

‘17 was the last year pitching was roughly equal to hitting. It wasn’t just CC Sabathia who was lethal, remember how nasty Vida Blue was? Verlander? Kershaw was a nightmare too. That’s because pitching was generally relevant in ‘17. When you aimed the ball somewhere and made good input, that’s exactly where the ball would end up.

‘18 was the first year we saw major problems with pitching. First, they reduced pitch speeds so much that you could take a nap between the pitcher releasing a 4 seamer and it actually reaching the plate. When people constantly complained, in what I can only assume was a hissy fit of petulance and frustration, SDS then released a “F you” patch, that made AS look like legend difficulty. The PCI was tiny and extremely sensitive, had a huge range of movement and even though pitches were still too slow, swing timing windows were narrowed as much as possible. Then when everyone inevitably complained again, they reverted to the “spamming low off speed” meta for the rest of the year.

‘19 was another terrible year for pitching in MLB the Show. Not only did we have the HR/9 debacle, where it didn’t do anything, then it made everything die at the track, then it didn’t do anything again, we also saw the introduction of the random hanger with good input. While most people were singing the praises of SS Kershaw and making up superlatives to describe how good he really was, the rest of us were scratching our heads as to why good/good was almost always a line out. It wasn’t that Kershaw was that good, he just scored highly in most RNG stat vs stat dice rolls. It was like having the best card in the deck at Top Trumps, no matter which stat it came down to, he usually had the upper hand. In any case, by the end of the year, pitching was pretty much exactly as it is in ‘20 currently. At least it shows they’re working on ideas and implementing them as the season wears on, I suppose.

The state of pitching in this game is not good at present. Input isn’t the determining factor in hanging a pitch, giving up a hit or a run, or hitting a spot in a crucial situation. You can still pitch to contact effectively at times, if I want a ground ball into the shift, or to try and get a hitter to pop up, I can often execute what I’m going for. That said, you can’t really dominate a game with a pitcher, unless you’re facing a bad opponent who will assist you by chasing a lot of bad pitches. Accuracy is more of an issue than pitch speeds and speed differentials, which aren’t that bad this year. A fastball is effective enough to set up an off speed pitch and vice versa. Even a good hitter can be blown away by an unexpected heater at 96mph, which suggests that pitch speeds are fine. The random hangers are not, the lack of accuracy is not, the fact that there’s pretty much nowhere you can pitch without the batter getting ridiculous foul tips and extending ABs until the random hanger comes is certainly not fine. Pitchers need a little more help, but the problem is it’s now baked into the game to have useless ineffective pitchers who throw the ball anywhere they feel like on reasonably good, albeit not perfect, input.

Everything you said is accurate, but I don't agree that it shows they're working on pitching. It shows that they recognize it has to be harder, but just like with hitting, they aren't taking the time to change the mechanics, they're simply trying to use RNG to make it harder.

They need to actually change the pitching mechanics and make good inputs harder to accomplish. Stats should matter for how fast the meter moves or how sensitive the analog movements are. It should affect how big the targets are to hit on meter and analog as well. Heck, this would probably make people mad, but make pitching clutch matter for the user, not RNG by making the ball shake slightly and controller vibrate when you're trying to hit your release points or aim. The more confident they are the less it moves and for dominant closers, have it be completely still. Have stamina factor into this as well. Show me that when I'm not confident my breaking pitches cannot break as much, don't just make it random and not let me know why.

These are the problems with pitching and how they need to really look at fixing them, but it would take a COMPLETE overhaul to the pitching system and they haven't really changed the mechanics of pitching in the game in who knows how long with the exception of adding pulse pitching.

@Kovz88 said in Hard for me to have fun anymore....:

This is actually the problem, too many people think they are better at the game than they actually are and therefore they buy into all the conspiracy theories. I know its hard for people to accept but most of us will never even sniff the top 50.

I understand to an extent the idea that some people think they're better than they are. At the same time, there are issues in the game that keep some people from reaching their potential in RS. I by no means believe I'm a top 50 player. I do believe that I could make WS, but never have. This year I've never put the time into trying. 716 last season was highest I've been. I play better on HOF than I do on AS, but it takes me forever to get out of AS.

Again, not saying I'm incredible, but I get "good" timing and have my PCI in good locations of the ball consistently, but I rarely get the HR results. This game plays HR or bust when it comes to winning games and I only seem to get HR on perfects or hits where my PCI is barely touching the ball. Perfects make sense, but the poor PCI HR don't. No conspiracy that the game is against me, but simply I cannot figure out what the game actual wants input wise to get HR.

As someone who has played The Show since 08, I'd just like more transparency on what makes the hitting engine tick if it's left as is. If not, I think two things would help hitting. One, reward good/good with more hits if there's not going to be adjustments to the engine at all. Two adjust the hitting to fine tune timing a little more. Give us Perfect just like it is (~.800 avg), but add Great (timing/contact) that has a higher rate of solid hits and avg in the .380-.450 range. Good (T/C) becomes more of the .280-.320 avg type results. Okay (T/C) that is low .200 and under. Lastly, PCI placement that doesn't touch the ball should be a swing and miss every single time, no exceptions. That has always baffled me.

Anyway, sorry this got super long, but I'd love to hear thoughts on this type of tweaking to the hitting engine.

@bhall09 said in MLB 21 Product Description (Interesting Note):

My question about that is they said stick skills over card ratings. So, can someone use a common and be better than someone else using a diamond? I guess that's good, maybe, but can't say for sure. And what would be the point of getting better cards then?

This would be a lazier way to look at it. Card's ratings should matter. They just shouldn't matter in the outcome. They should matter in the way the card is used. Lower contact, noticeably smaller PCI. Poor vision, smaller timing window. Low power, lower exit velo ability than high power guys. Pitchers with high control should have bigger contact spots on the meter or analog bars. Low BB/9 should mean the ball cursor is shakier when you try and pick your location. These are ways you can make the game have more importance on user input, but still make card ratings matter. Problem is, it would mean a total overhaul to the game's mechanics and SDS won't do that.

Jim Abbott

If you’re playing the cpu and they foul off two pitches in 1-2 or 0-2 counts it’s an easy fix. Throw a change up or breaking pitch if they don’t have a change low enough to be an easy take. Throw a fastball for a strike up and away and they’ll swing and miss 95% of the time.

Good doesn't mean good. It means. Almost perfect, fantastic, great, good, pretty good, above average, okay, mediocre, and awful. At least based on the results I get in game with "good" timing, that's how I see it. Ha ha

I played online franchise in 15 and 16 for the full game cycles. Our league fell apart in 17 because of some of the issues so I started playing DD about halfway through the game cycle and enjoyed it. Although 18 wasn't a great game, playing DD got old by mid-November and I quit playing the game completely in December. This year I've played DD and enjoyed it more because it's a better game than 18, but I'm done with it and it's been stale for the past month.
Content for DD isn't the issue. There's plenty of that. It's the way the game plays so randomly online with the changing settings, random connection quality for opponents and for the most part having no real progression. Yes, we get new players all the time, but there's no reason to use lower end or younger players. My favorite thing in DD was building a farm system in year one by trading away my better players and then slowly building my team back with key FA I wanted or even other players that fit my team style better. Doing this offline is boring and stale considering the mode hasn't been changed in nearly 4 years or more.

I played the 2nd inning program for 3 and a half hours last night. Any time I had to face Feller for the boss I forfeit the run. I basically tried to set up my team with as many lefties and go for facing Giles as the main boss. Whenever I would just skip to the boss and need 15 runs I could score 11-13 runs easy every time. Whenever I tried playing all the missions and only needed like 7-8 runs to win the whole thing, I couldn't score 3. CPU would dot the corners, make diving catches, and all my good/good and good/squared hits were right at people. Finally beat them on a walk off with 1 out left and 2 strike count. Saving grace was my gold choice pack ended up being Trout! I'll take it.

I watched the Lightning game, which started at 3pm. Switched over to the Rays game, that started at 7:30pm, and it was in the 6th inning already! Bolts and Jackets had to have been exhausted after that.

@bri_25 said in Flash sale?:

@ItsaCanesthing said in Flash sale?:

@Ikasnu said in Flash sale?:

Yes one on Friday and one on Saturday. Believe one was for HRD packs.

Edit: Second is a Ducks on the Pond pack. Don't know which day is what pack but watch out for them.

Thank you.
That DOTP is a for sure purchase for me.......Still hoping for the Aroldis luck.

Pretty sure if you just finish all 4 POTM you get an Elite DOTP which is guaranteed Aroldis, Banks, or Adell

You get the elite pack, but it's not a guaranteed elite round. It's a normal elite pack which were the ones with three rounds versus 2 rounds.

I had mine on and so did a friend of mine and we didn't get anything, so it didn't go to everyone or they're still sending them out.

His team affinity diamond in 19 was sneaky good. I had him in my rotation for half the year and his ERA was under 2.2. I don't know what it is about him, but he was tough for people to hit.

People complain, I can't hit high and in fastballs, they're too hard. SDS nerfs fastball speeds.
People complain, I can't hit Phil Neikro and Luis Tiant (sp? on both guys). SDS takes them out of the game.
People complain, I can't hit Steven Wright and the other garbage lefty knuckleballer. SDS changes MOST events so they aren't eligible.
Now we're complaining about sinkers not thrown realistic ... Seriously guys, if you want to play a SIM ONLY baseball game, just play the CPU with custom sliders. It's a video game and people are going to do what they need to do to make it harder to beat them.
Let's complain about real issue when they're prevalent like when fielders have too many unrealistic errors or can't lock onto a ball properly or when people use to play anyone OOP with little penalty to have extra bats in the lineup w/out being penalized. Otherwise we're going to be left with a game that looks pretty and plays like NES RBI Baseball where we just push a button to pitch, swing, or throw and the game does the rest.