Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 14 Version]
My observation on these plays so far is that I tend to see a lot more bang-bang plays at 1B than I remember before, but many more of them turn into outs than safe. This is just impression and I am not saying from evidence that I can supply. But I feel the reason may be that a few new fielding animations that I often see now physically take more time to make those plays, which in my view is a good thing because they remove the feeling of rush that I think was not really necessary on some plays.
In my opinion, infield hits are an issue that cannot be solved just by tweaking BR Speed, and the real culprit affecting the amount of infield hits is the "poor" hit variety in the game.
As far as I see, prior to MLB 14, most infield hits happened in (1) grounders to the left side of SS where he needs to make a long throw, (2) grounders to the right side of SS where he nonchalantly makes two-step throw, and (3) choppers around the plate fielded by either P or C. I think (1) is fine. The (2) was an animation issue which has been addressed this year by a new animation of SS making a snap throw while running, so it's probably okay. The nagging kind is (3), where a weakly hit chopper stays around the home plate.
I think the game produces a bit too many of (3) as a result of poor contact, when in real life generating that type of hit is very difficult or nearly impossible. The balance of out/safe mostly depends on how fast P/C fields the ball and makes the throw (with varying results in the past). But in real life, choppers tend to bounce a lot harder off the ground, like this:
They often bounce even higher than infielders can reach. A lot of them are actually the reverse of fly balls, just the launch angle is down toward the ground instead of going up in the air. You still don't really see this kind of "poor" hits in the game.
Choppers we see in the game tend to be of very weakly hit variety that stays and nerfed totally around the plate. I think that is the major issue right now, as far as infield hits of the kind you talk about are concerned. And I don't think this is physically realistic, because after all you are hitting a baseball pitch coming at you with a very high velocity and therefore a lot of energy. And that energy needs to go somewhere after a contact is made (i.e., conservation of energy), so if that energy is not in the batted ball, then it will go to either the bat (which sometimes breaks because of this) or the body of the hitter (who might feel sting). (As an aside, this is also why when squaring up with the sweetest spot, the hitter does not really feel much sting in his hands, because the transfer of energy from the bat/body is so smooth that much of it goes to the ball itself.)
So that's my opinion. Rather than fixing through BR speed, the poor hit variety needs to be tweaked in the game.
I actually lowered them for the newest set. I'm just not in a hurry to tweak those sliders till I have enough games played to see if the tweaks are necessary. But in general I think the fielding side of the game has been slowed down further, so I don't think it is as much of an issue as it were in the past.
It was a compromise that I made to increase BABIP without affecting a lot of other things, like plate discipline. I almost needed to account for .030 in BABIP which is quite huge, so I assumed increasing line drives is the most effective way of doing this. I would be more inclined to reduce FBs and increase GBs rather than just increasing the proportion on LDs, but you cannot do that with the current set of sliders.
I'm not really concerned about K% that much. It might be slightly down because of the changes that I have been making, but not outside of the realistic range. If I have to change this, then I will probably try using Foul Frequency slider first. Timing slider might affect solid hits, etc., which might not be desirable.
My observation on these plays so far is that I tend to see a lot more bang-bang plays at 1B than I remember before, but many more of them turn into outs than safe. This is just impression and I am not saying from evidence that I can supply. But I feel the reason may be that a few new fielding animations that I often see now physically take more time to make those plays, which in my view is a good thing because they remove the feeling of rush that I think was not really necessary on some plays.
In my opinion, infield hits are an issue that cannot be solved just by tweaking BR Speed, and the real culprit affecting the amount of infield hits is the "poor" hit variety in the game.
As far as I see, prior to MLB 14, most infield hits happened in (1) grounders to the left side of SS where he needs to make a long throw, (2) grounders to the right side of SS where he nonchalantly makes two-step throw, and (3) choppers around the plate fielded by either P or C. I think (1) is fine. The (2) was an animation issue which has been addressed this year by a new animation of SS making a snap throw while running, so it's probably okay. The nagging kind is (3), where a weakly hit chopper stays around the home plate.
I think the game produces a bit too many of (3) as a result of poor contact, when in real life generating that type of hit is very difficult or nearly impossible. The balance of out/safe mostly depends on how fast P/C fields the ball and makes the throw (with varying results in the past). But in real life, choppers tend to bounce a lot harder off the ground, like this:
Spoiler
They often bounce even higher than infielders can reach. A lot of them are actually the reverse of fly balls, just the launch angle is down toward the ground instead of going up in the air. You still don't really see this kind of "poor" hits in the game.
Choppers we see in the game tend to be of very weakly hit variety that stays and nerfed totally around the plate. I think that is the major issue right now, as far as infield hits of the kind you talk about are concerned. And I don't think this is physically realistic, because after all you are hitting a baseball pitch coming at you with a very high velocity and therefore a lot of energy. And that energy needs to go somewhere after a contact is made (i.e., conservation of energy), so if that energy is not in the batted ball, then it will go to either the bat (which sometimes breaks because of this) or the body of the hitter (who might feel sting). (As an aside, this is also why when squaring up with the sweetest spot, the hitter does not really feel much sting in his hands, because the transfer of energy from the bat/body is so smooth that much of it goes to the ball itself.)
So that's my opinion. Rather than fixing through BR speed, the poor hit variety needs to be tweaked in the game.
I appreciate greatly the statistically accurate approach which works well with some sliders, both the speed and reaction sliders I feel need to be looked at from an eye test approach as well. Something I am not the greatest at so I use others sound reasoning. Personally I can see a need to lower fielder reaction to 4, baserunning speed to 3 or 4, arm strength to 3 or lower, and fielder speed a bit. The challenge is finding a balance to reproduce accurate 2B/3B numbers in combination with passing the eye test of the gameplay.
I don't mean to go on a tangent, just curious if you plan to touch those group of sliders at all?
I don't mean to go on a tangent, just curious if you plan to touch those group of sliders at all?
If you don't mind can I ask what made you raise solid hits to 7? I had thought that slider mainly impacted LD% but those numbers looked good on the default testing.
I know you addressed the BB being low still and how you are working on that, but how about strikeouts? Would lowering timing a notch be enough or would that have other unintended effects you wish to avoid?
I always look forward to see what changes you make to balancing things and your approach. Thanks for another year of unparalleled work!
I always look forward to see what changes you make to balancing things and your approach. Thanks for another year of unparalleled work!
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