Pitcher confidence

[nomo17k]

Re: Pitcher confidence

... I dont really care either if a dev has said confidence has no impact on getting hits, that's just demonstrably false. ....

Unfortunately people who make big deal out of pitcher confidence have never really "demonstrated" that it is the prime factor determining the effectiveness of a pitcher... I'm always curious about how the game works, so if there are good information I'm generally very interested in knowing them. Few discussions around confidence have been interesting, unfortunately... I'm not sure how you demonstrated your case here either.

... I don't think Brian has said confidence has no impact on results. What we can know from what the devs like Brian and Woodweaver have revealed... confidence affects pitchers' effectiveness through pitch command, and we obviously know how important command is in pitching. What confidence doesn't do is to affect important player attributes (like H/9 and K/9) directly, which energy does.

[wellred]

Re: Pitcher confidence

... I don't think Brian has said confidence has no impact on results.

He said it was like 10% of the equation, I already said that. So pretty minimal, and very obviously not something to be taken that seriously.


I don't plan to demonstrate to anyone that pitcher confidence plays a massive role in the game. If it is not self evident already then there's little I can do beyond posting game videos of me smashing dudes with zero confidence which you will just dismiss as 'small sample size' anyways even if I hit 18 straight homeruns off the guy or whatever. How would you suggest one demonstrate it, exactly? I don't think you have any idea. So asking me to demonstrate an observation that has been refined over years of playing the game is disingenuous at best. And obviously you have no idea how to prove your claims either, outside a forum post you think is the end all be all in the matter, which it isn't.


If you won't get into batting practice mode for an hour or two and actually hit off pitchers with 0 confidence and a full energy bar and witness for yourself how the pitchers performance directly disproves the claim of this particular developer, that stamina is by far the most important in game resource for a pitcher, well no you probably wouldn't find the whole discussion interesting because you're not going to learn anything anyways. But my guess everyone who plays this game has at one time or another done that has seen how much a 0 confidence bar actually effects the hitting mechanics in this game, it's just a matter of admitting 'yes it's hugely important' or for some reason, going with what this developer said about it rather than how the mechanic actually seems to work.

[nomo17k]

Re: Pitcher confidence

...

I don't plan to demonstrate to anyone that pitcher confidence plays a massive role in the game. If it is not self evident already then there's little I can do beyond posting game videos of me smashing dudes with zero confidence which you will just dismiss as 'small sample size' anyways even if I hit 18 straight homeruns off the guy or whatever.

...

Well you are the one who wrote that the forum post by the person who actually programmed the game engine is "demonstrably false"... I'm not the one who made the claim, so I'm certainly not asking you to provide the demonstration.

I'm just saying nobody to my knowledge has adequately demonstrated the claim that confidence matters more than energy.

For one thing I personally definitely feel energy has much stronger effect on pitcher effectiveness... and that's much easier to demonstrate, as the PCI size becomes visibly larger once pitcher energy becomes low. That's definitely demonstrable... unlike pitcher confidence.

To the point about batting practice... I don't believe pitcher energy and confidence is visible during that mini mode (are they?)... so it's not particularly meaningful thing to do.

[wellred]

Re: Pitcher confidence

To the point about batting practice... I don't believe pitcher energy and confidence is visible during that mini mode (are they?)... so it's not particularly meaningful thing to do.

They most definitely are, at least up to and including last years version. This year I'm not sure I don't have the new version of the game yet. But I dunno, the last 4-5 years it's definitely been there, otherwise I wouldn't have known that 1. Confidence in BP can go down and 2. Stamina does not. I use that mode a lot and that is a big part of what I'm basing my observations on. And to me it's a far easier mode to actually test how much confidence plays a role because you can strike out on purpose 30 times in a row, and that will max the ptichers confidence (which will carry over to the subsequent 'rounds') and observe the visable differences as he loses confidence while stamina will be a constant. I don't see how that's not helpful, it's the perfect conditions to test pitcher confidence.

[xVVIllx]

Re: Pitcher confidence

Not sure what game modes this dude that loves Brian plays in, but the OP is correct. Pitchers confidence is the most important on whether he is going to get shelled or not. If a pitchers confidence is low even the worst hitters can go yard off the best pitchers. Show me a case where it isn't true. I don't care what a developer says. The confidence is basically like an energy level as if you were playing a boss on a fighting game. Get a pitchers confidence down and you can light them up like the 4th of July. It is true 100%. But for complaining about it, I like that you can get to pitchers heads this way if you're a good hitter and completely get them out of their game. And pitchers that aren't rated as good can get on roles as well. It gives the game good balance and focuses more on actual play more than rating. But for the dude that doesn't get it about confidence being a major factor in how well someone can hit. Play the game more often...

[nomo17k]

Re: Pitcher confidence

People sure do have a lot of confidence for little substance here...

[videobastard]

Re: Pitcher confidence

I have seen countless times a pitcher give up 2 sometimes 3 and on a few occasions give up 4 homeruns in a row because the confidence was down in early innings of games. Some guys online don't mound visit and its like homeun derby when pitchers confidence gets low.

Energy plays more into the game later on in 9 inning games. But the confidence can really open up big innings at any point if the person pitching is not careful after giving up homers. In the 3 inning games energy is more of a factor but I see more people losing based on starting pitchers low confidence then energy issues in 9 inning games.

[nomo17k]

Re: Pitcher confidence

They most definitely are, at least up to and including last years version. This year I'm not sure I don't have the new version of the game yet. But I dunno, the last 4-5 years it's definitely been there, otherwise I wouldn't have known that 1. Confidence in BP can go down and 2. Stamina does not. I use that mode a lot and that is a big part of what I'm basing my observations on. And to me it's a far easier mode to actually test how much confidence plays a role because you can strike out on purpose 30 times in a row, and that will max the ptichers confidence (which will carry over to the subsequent 'rounds') and observe the visable differences as he loses confidence while stamina will be a constant. I don't see how that's not helpful, it's the perfect conditions to test pitcher confidence.

If you can view confidence and energy in BP and also are sure that they work similarly both in BP and in other game modes, sure it could provide meaningful data points if you can set up conditions properly (i.e., getting data at various energy and confidence values).

But if energy (not stamina though) does not vary in BP, you cannot probe the effect of energy relative to confidence and vice versa though... I am not arguing that high confidence pitchers are not harder to hit.... they are harder to hit, but that's more likely because pitchers give you less hittable pitches (i.e., deeper in the strike zone), and not because the game is giving PCI penalty/bonus which is what you seem to be talking about.

I think the feeling that confidence is very influential can be stronger among guys who uses Directional/Timing interface... because they are not really in charge of moving PCI at will, they are more likely to hit poorly when the opposing pitcher locates his pitches well. (I could see some people feeling "cheated" when the pitcher keeps making his pitches when confidence is high and therefore the hitting AI that they are delegating the PCI movement cannot square up.)

With Zone, guys can be ready for pitches in any location (around strike zone) at will, so even if the opposing pitcher makes his pitch, they can hit well if they guess it correctly.

These days I tend to use Zone more often, so I don't feel anything really magical about pitcher confidence in the context that I just described. High confidence pitchers are definitely harder to hit, but that's more due to them being able to paint the black/corners well.

[wellred]

Re: Pitcher confidence

Not sure what game modes this dude that loves Brian plays in, but the OP is correct. Pitchers confidence is the most important on whether he is going to get shelled or not. If a pitchers confidence is low even the worst hitters can go yard off the best pitchers. Show me a case where it isn't true. I don't care what a developer says. The confidence is basically like an energy level as if you were playing a boss on a fighting game. Get a pitchers confidence down and you can light them up like the 4th of July. It is true 100%. But for complaining about it, I like that you can get to pitchers heads this way if you're a good hitter and completely get them out of their game. And pitchers that aren't rated as good can get on roles as well. It gives the game good balance and focuses more on actual play more than rating. But for the dude that doesn't get it about confidence being a major factor in how well someone can hit. Play the game more often...

Yeah, I don't really see it as a bad thing either. That wasn't what I was trying to say, though the OP obviously doesn't like it. I just turn it off (the on screen indicator) and try to manage the game organically, it makes it a lot more fun and realistic. But I know in the back of my mind if a dude is scuffling out there the low confidence is about to bite him in the ***.

[jeffy777]

Re: Pitcher confidence

High confidence pitchers are definitely harder to hit, but that's more due to them being able to paint the black/corners well.

/thread

[wellred]

Re: Pitcher confidence

/thread

So being able to hit the corners well is 10% of pitching effectively?


lol okay. I think Greg Maddux would like to have a word with you and the dev on this.


I have not seen any argument to suggest that confidence isn't the most important in game attribute for a pitcher, semantics aside.

[jeffy777]

Re: Pitcher confidence

So being able to hit the corners well is 10% of pitching effectively?


lol okay. I think Greg Maddux would like to have a word with you and the dev on this.


I have not seen any argument to suggest that confidence isn't the most important in game quantifier for a pitcher.

I'm not getting into the 10% argument. Just saying the nomo's quote is a good summary of confidence in this game. I have no problem punishing high confidence pitcher's when they make mistakes...the thing is they just make less mistakes. I also agree with what nomo said about zone vs directional hitting. It's much easier to take adavnatage of those mistakes with zone, so pitcher confidence is definitely more frustrating for directional hitters.

[wellred]

Re: Pitcher confidence

I'm not getting into the 10% argument. Just saying the nomo's quote is a good summary of confidence in this game. I have no problem punishing high confidence pitcher's when they make mistakes...the thing is they just make mistakes less.

Nomos position is a bit nonsensical to be perfectly honest. That energy is the most important overall resource for a pitcher in a given game. When that would only be a detriment to a pitcher later in a game, whereas the confidence attribute can cause a pitcher to have a poor performance at ANY point in the game. The logic just isn't there, unfortunately. It's pretty easy to avoid pitching with low energy, it means it's time for them to come out of the game. Taking a starter out in the second inning because he has low confidence, yeah just a little bit harder to work around that.


Where is the logic that energy is more important?

[rjackson]

Re: Pitcher confidence

Nomo has been around forever as have I, and he has soaked up, organized, and saved like every word the devs have ever shared with us. He is also trustworthy. If you don't want to believe him, that is fine. Don't. I'm telling you that if he told me that he saw a unicorn and they really do fart rainbows, I would believe him. He's earned that reputation.


I think that what has happened is we've all witnessed bad outings. They come out with default confidence and give up a HR and that just cascades. We've married the confidence to the results when we should just look at it as it was just a bad outing. It happens and confidence might just be a tool to help that get replicated.


What has not been discussed is individual pitch confidence. I find that to be mostly a good tool to replicate that slider is on but curve is off today feeling - or just cannot locate the fastball today. I'm surprised that there is not more discussion on this, though. I do find that a secondary pitch can be on and then because of a single ball 4 or xbh, that pitcher just cannot throw that pitch anymore. But your X pitch, the fastball, is really quick to pick back up.

[wellred]

Re: Pitcher confidence

Anyone can be wrong. Personally when it comes to energy the only time Ill leave a guy in there when I get the 'x is getting tired' message is if he's been lights out all day, otherwise next batter he's gone. That works out about as well as you'd think it would, sometimes he's still lights out, sometimes he starts giving up hits. It's very easy most games to avoid working your guy over 100 pitches if you choose, so losing effectiveness under 25% stamina is probably the most irrelevant 'important' thing for me in a video game ever, I hardly get to sample that gameplay wrinkle.


I also don't buy into confidence being more pronounced on directional. For a skilled hitter it's always going to be easier to smash the ball on zone, I get way more solid contact on zone hitting irrespective of the current game scenario. But why should the quadrants the pitcher is spotting his pitches in matter when your pci is basically random? A broken clock that is right twice a day is still going to be right twice a day regardless of what time zone it's in. Theoretically the pci placement should be 'right' about it being down the middle just as often as it's right about it being up and in.