MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Available Now - Patch Notes and Discussion

[Brian SCEA]

Re: MLB The Show 20: Patch 1.04 Notes and Discussion

One note on the difficulty change. The difference is 1/4 the gap between Veteran and Allstar (or 1/2 the difference between Veteran+ and Allstar in Dynamic). Another way of saying it is, every time you change difficulty in DD (through matchmaking, etc..), you blow way past this level of change by a factor of 4x (going from Veteran to Allstar is the same as applying the patch 4 times).

Between difficulty settings, the biggest result is you get more swing and misses and fouls on your worst swings. The swing feedback meaning doesn't really change (Perfect-Perfect, Squared Up, Good, Okay, etc..). Difficulty does not change the hit types - what changes is how often you earn them.

On hit type feedback, the strategy guide quotes the user stats from Beta. This is from averaging tens of thousands of users:
Batting average on Perfect Contact is around .850.

What this means is that 5 out of 6 P-P are going to end up hits on average. It's quite normal for one person to get 10 hits in a row and another person to go 2 for 5 - both people are playing the same game. To illustrate, I rolled random numbers 1 to 6, 5 times for each user. Imagine that 5 = an out on perfect-perfect:
14155
62422
23624
13266
42555
24334

User 1 went 3 for 5, and user 5 went 2 for 5. Users 2, 3, 4, 6 all went perfect 5 for 5.

Same thing goes for getting HRs with perfect-perfect. This is influenced by how you swing (flyballs or groundballs) and the batter's attribute (a pitcher is not going to HR as often), but otherwise the same idea applies. About 30% of perfect-perfect are HRs but you will get streaks naturally.

Last I checked, Squared Up was around 60-65% hits depending on type and attribute again. You are going to get streaks both ways.

[RunN1st]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

Update 1.04 is set to deploy at 3 AM PT on Thursday, 3/19/2020.

Gameplay

• Pitch speed slider has more range.

I already have the pitch speed pegged at 100% - this will be interesting.

This is why I upped the speeds...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_nawK4KY5A

[countryboy]

Re: MLB The Show 20: Patch 1.04 Notes and Discussion

One note on the difficulty change. The difference is 1/4 the gap between Veteran and Allstar (or 1/2 the difference between Veteran+ and Allstar in Dynamic). Another way of saying it is, every time you change difficulty in DD (through matchmaking, etc..), you blow way past this level of change by a factor of 4x (going from Veteran to Allstar is the same as applying the patch 4 times).

Between difficulty settings, the biggest result is you get more swing and misses and fouls on your worst swings. The swing feedback meaning doesn't really change (Perfect-Perfect, Squared Up, Good, Okay, etc..). Difficulty does not change the hit types - what changes is how often you earn them.

On hit type feedback, the strategy guide quotes the user stats from Beta. This is from averaging tens of thousands of users:
Batting average on Perfect Contact is around .850.

What this means is that 5 out of 6 P-P are going to end up hits on average. It's quite normal for one person to get 10 hits in a row and another person to go 2 for 5 - both people are playing the same game. To illustrate, I rolled random numbers 1 to 6, 5 times for each user. Imagine that 6 = an out on perfect-perfect:
14155
62422
23624
13266
42555
24334

User 1 went 3 for 5, and user 5 went 2 for 5. Users 2, 3, 4, 6 all went perfect 5 for 5.

Same thing goes for getting HRs with perfect-perfect. This is influenced by how you swing (flyballs or groundballs) and the batter's attribute (a pitcher is not going to HR as often), but otherwise the same idea applies. About 30% of perfect-perfect are HRs but you will get streaks naturally.

Last I checked, Squared Up was around 60-65% hits depending on type and attribute again. You are going to get streaks both ways.

Thank you for the explanation Brian!

[King Gro23]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

What's going on with the Granderson missions? Because I only have one more to complete to finish the b Granderson program

I am not buying that it has been in the works for weeks. It is a patch that fixes a bug that seemed to really happen after the 1.03 patch (which was important to get fixed). It also adjusts hitting, that was not actually bugged but some people thought was too easy. Not people playing Showdown for example, but the best hitters online.

There are so many bugs across so many modes that it is hard to get behind a patch that prioritizes hitting difficulty over bug fixes.

Meanwhile I can't finish my Evolution card upgrade by getting some stats that are needed because all of the Evolution cards and the Granderson card have a bug in their stat missions that cause them not to count for a lot of players.

Sent from my SM-G965U using Operation Sports mobile app

[Cold Snap]

Re: MLB The Show 20: Patch 1.04 Notes and Discussion

I was really looking forward to starting my first Dynasty thread--I think I have a truly unique idea for writing one that I hope you'll like.

But until the minor league option issue is fixed, by SDS or the fans, I can't start it. My OCD would never allow it.

[Brian SCEA]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

Copy of a post I made on another thread:
One note on the difficulty change. The difference is 1/4 the gap between Veteran and Allstar (or 1/2 the difference between Veteran+ and Allstar in Dynamic). Another way of saying it is, every time you change difficulty in DD (through matchmaking, etc..), you blow way past this level of change by a factor of 4x (going from Veteran to Allstar is the same as applying the patch 4 times).

Between difficulty settings, the biggest result is you get more swing and misses and fouls on your worst swings. The swing feedback meaning doesn't really change (Perfect-Perfect, Squared Up, Good, Okay, etc..). Difficulty does not change the hit types - what changes is how often you earn them.

On hit type feedback, the strategy guide quotes the user stats from Beta. This is from averaging tens of thousands of users:
Batting average on Perfect Contact is around .850.

What this means is that 5 out of 6 P-P are going to end up hits on average. It's quite normal for one person to get 10 hits in a row and another person to go 2 for 5 - both people are playing the same game. To illustrate, I rolled random numbers 1 to 6, 5 times for each user. Imagine that 5 = an out on perfect-perfect:
14155
62422
23624
13266
42555
24334

User 1 went 3 for 5, and user 5 went 2 for 5. Users 2, 3, 4, 6 all went perfect 5 for 5.

Same thing goes for getting HRs with perfect-perfect. This is influenced by how you swing (flyballs or groundballs) and the batter's attribute (a pitcher is not going to HR as often), but otherwise the same idea applies. About 30% of perfect-perfect are HRs but you will get streaks naturally.

Last I checked, Squared Up was around 60-65% hits depending on type and attribute again. You are going to get streaks both ways.

[Brian SCEA]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

I use 10 for both on HOF and they are for sure faster.

A 10 will be exactly 2.0 mph faster.

[Brian SCEA]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

I'm curious to see if default pitch speeds are changed at all with the update to the pitch speed slider.

They're the same. If they seem slow to you, that's because you are exceptional.

There are going to be a lot of people who see the pitches as slow. There are roughly exactly the same number of people who see the pitches as fast. This is trickier in two-player games because you need to negotiate some intermediate value.

The difference between a Legend user and an Allstar user is the same as the difference between the average MLB hitter an a pitcher. Yet there are many users starting out and well below Allstar.

[Farmerdlt]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

Notes for new patch said only effect DD. Seems to have effected my offline dynasty as well, which I don’t appreciate. I had everything set for my personal enjoyment now I can’t find any combination of setting/sliders to get it back.

[countryboy]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

They're the same. If they seem slow to you, that's because you are exceptional.

There are going to be a lot of people who see the pitches as slow. There are roughly exactly the same number of people who see the pitches as fast. This is trickier in two-player games because you need to negotiate some intermediate value.

The difference between a Legend user and an Allstar user is the same as the difference between the average MLB hitter an a pitcher. Yet there are many users starting out and well below Allstar.

I knew I was special!!

They don't seem overly slow, just don't seem quite as fast as last year, but not enough that have warranted me to make a change.

On the topic of pitching and to tie in with the community seeing an influx of homeruns, it seems to me that there are more "hangers/meatball" pitches in the game versus previous years, which I think is leading to more hard hit balls that in turn result in more homeruns. And this is happening with great/elite pitchers and not just a back end rotation starter who you may expect to leave more hittable pitches out over the plate.

I was curious if SDS has any data that shows the number of "bad/mistake" pitches that could be analyzed to see if this is indeed happening or if its a whole other set of variables that is leading the community to see an influx in power numbers?

Myself, I see it, but not to the level where I've made a decision to adjust sliders to "fix" the issue.

Thank you for your explanations and responses, they are greatly appreciated!

[jcar0725]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

They're the same. If they seem slow to you, that's because you are exceptional.

There are going to be a lot of people who see the pitches as slow. There are roughly exactly the same number of people who see the pitches as fast. This is trickier in two-player games because you need to negotiate some intermediate value.

The difference between a Legend user and an Allstar user is the same as the difference between the average MLB hitter an a pitcher. Yet there are many users starting out and well below Allstar.

Count me as one of those who finds the pitch speed fast on default in every version of this game. I have to knock it down a notch to keep things realistic in my franchise.

[Brian SCEA]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

There are so many bugs across so many modes that it is hard to get behind a patch that prioritizes hitting difficulty over bug fixes.

You would not want your plumber working on your electricity. So whoever works on the game's hitting is only looking at the hitting. Speaking only for myself, I looked at other parts of the game, I would probably break it. I barely understand it.

There are wider reasons for the hitting change, but they are related to the exit velo this year compared to last year. I don't know if any stream has mentioned it, but based on last year's game we wanted to make that sure as you ranked up in difficulty you still got hard hits - it will just be harder to make contact and put the ball into play. This patch has to happen sooner or later because it gets exposed more as you approach WS and build up your teams.

As the previous notes pointed out, Perfect-Perfect hasn't changed nor Squared Up. Anyone can hit a 450 HR on Legend DD, it just won't be easy. And as the previous post mentioned, it's a 1/4 difficulty change and difficulty doesn't affect the hit types but how often you get them. But I understand the patch just came out so people are going to judge based on the wording rather than what the patch does.

Simply put: Count the batting average on Perfect-Perfect - it's going to be unchanged in the long run.

[JoshC1977]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

You would not want your plumber working on your electricity. So whoever works on the game's hitting is only looking at the hitting. Speaking only for myself, I looked at other parts of the game, I would probably break it. I barely understand it.

LOL, this made me laugh and it is such a good analogy.

There are wider reasons for the hitting change, but they are related to the exit velo this year compared to last year. I don't know if any stream has mentioned it, but based on last year's game we wanted to make that sure as you ranked up in difficulty you still got hard hits - it will just be harder to make contact and put the ball into play. This patch has to happen sooner or later because it gets exposed more as you approach WS and build up your teams.

I love this explanation - thank you. How you guys managed to do this AND improve greatly on the hit variety is exceptional.

I was curious if SDS has any data that shows the number of "bad/mistake" pitches that could be analyzed to see if this is indeed happening or if its a whole other set of variables that is leading the community to see an influx in power numbers?

I'd like to "second" this request.

Also, Brian, are you able to elaborate on which slider solution might help minimize this without other deleterious effects? I'm convinced an increase to CPU Pitch Control is a viable option (rather than decreasing strike frequency as that seems to alter how the AI pitches to the user). However, I'd love your take if you're able to provide one.

[Farmerdlt]

Had my dynasty perfectly set for my enjoyment on HOF, but new patch has messed everything up and i can’t find slider combination to get it back.  

[Brian SCEA]

Re: MLB The Show 20 Patch 1.04 Arrives Later This Morning - Patch Notes Here

On the topic of pitching and to tie in with the community seeing an influx of homeruns, it seems to me that there are more "hangers/meatball" pitches in the game versus previous years, which I think is leading to more hard hit balls that in turn result in more homeruns. And this is happening with great/elite pitchers and not just a back end rotation starter who you may expect to leave more hittable pitches out over the plate.

I gather user stats twice a year for detailed analysis on topics like this. I hate to give strategy advice, so let me present some hard facts instead. Compared to MLB, users in our game are choosing to throw too many strikes to power hitters. It's fine to throw strikes to most of the lineup, but in MLB pitchers pitch differently when a power guy walks up. Most of our users don't do that.

Maybe there's something else wrong with the game. Whatever that might be, this blows that away. I can go into the detailed numbers on why this has to be for good pitching strategy, but there are hundreds of articles on this. So I'll speak very generally for illustration.

Most of the time in both MLB and the game, a hanging pitch is not even a hit. The batter doesn't swing, or misses, or fouls, or hits it for a normal out even if solid. The difference is with a power hitter, you are risking a HR versus an out - compared to a regular hitter being more often a 1B or 2B versus an out. For simplicity that's a gap of 4 bases versus a gap of 1.5 bases. The risk reward ratio is totally different.

So you walk power hitters a lot when you 'dont have to'. You would think that contact hitters are better at taking balls than power hitters - and they are. But who gets the most walks? Check the leaderboards. On a good year Gallo will get 70+ walks. Ichiro could hope for 50. This is not because Gallo is more careful about what he swings at - but how pitchers pitch around him.