Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

[dsmith710]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Contact: 7
Power: 5
Timing: 1
Foul Frequency: 2
Solid Hit: 5
Starter Stamina: 5
Reliever Stamina: 5
Pitcher Control: 3
Pitcher Consistency: 4
Strike Frequency: 6
Manager Hook: 5
Pickoffs: 5
Fastball PS: 4
Offspeed PS: 4
Fielding Errors In: 9
Fielding Errors Out: 3
Throwing Errors In: 6
Throwing Errors Out: 8
Fielder Run Speed: 5
Fielder Reaction: 5
Fielder AS In: 4
Fielder AS Out: 5
BR Speed: 5
BR Steal Ability: 10
BR Steal Frequency: 7
Wind: 5
Injury Frequency: 5
Trade Frequency: 5

Is this what you're testing on the "4/24" tab in the doc? I can't see the sliders in the doc I'm currently on mobile. They seem to be the sweet spot where I'd want to start a franchise with.

[KBLover]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

What are you concerned with? And what have you been seeing (in numbers you can track easily at least)? My suggestion would depend on what you are actually seeing.

It's a cliche, but small sample size is always a concern. There is a reason why I get in some crazy number of games in to rack up stats before I allow myself to say "perhaps this is good enough..."

Like with Chi Chi... he can occasionally pitch very well and that's not surprising. Tanner Roark isn't anyone's definition of strikeout pitcher, but he struck out 15 the other day... so not seeing those "anomaly" at all is not realistic either.

Yeah - I don't plan on making any changes just yet. He did give up a single and a HR (game saved in the 3rd inning hope to finish it tonight sometime - he's allowed 2 hits in 3 innings with 4 Ks and a walk so far).

I think two of those were caught looking. One was a bad chase - must have really been fooled on his slider.

[nomo17k]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Is this what you're testing on the "4/24" tab in the doc? I can't see the sliders in the doc I'm currently on mobile. They seem to be the sweet spot where I'd want to start a franchise with.

Yes that's the 4/24 slider set.

[Scrapps]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Nomo, I've been using the 4/24 set on All Star directional/classic, for about five games now. The numbers look very good, with one exception. Strikeouts. Both the cpu and myself, are averaging in the neighborhood of 4-5 per game. What would you suggest? Lower contact or timing, while raising solid hits?

[nomo17k]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Nomo, I've been using the 4/24 set on All Star directional/classic, for about five games now. The numbers look very good, with one exception. Strikeouts. Both the cpu and myself, are averaging in the neighborhood of 4-5 per game. What would you suggest? Lower contact or timing, while raising solid hits?

I would give it more than five games before I get concerned about this... at the very least 10 games.

That said, if you are controlling hitters yourself, it's possible that your discipline may be better than CPU and you are not swinging (and missing) at good pitches CPU makes. certainly tend to belong to this group.

With Timing/Directional, there are a few ideas that I can think of increasing Ks when you are hitting against CPU:

(1) Do not use contact swing (as a house rule).

(2) Increase Pitch Speed sliders. If you are *not* consistently late and going for the opposite field, I would actually increase Pitch Speed to make your discipline worse (but it would have unfortunate side effect on SB%...). In general, you should set Pitch Speed sliders so that you see slightly more "pull" in batted balls than being late consistently though.

(3) Lower one of Contact/Timing/Foul Frequency. Which slider to lower depends on the detail of how you are not getting K'ed as much, so unless I have some meaningful data to go by I'm not sure which one to adjust.


As for pitching to CPU, it's possible you are pitching to the strike zone more than you should, if you are going for K's. I would take a look at strike % and see if you are around 64% consistently. If your strike % is much higher (like 70%), you are trading Ks for pitching to contact; if you are much lower then you might be nibbling too much. That's the first thing I would look at.

[KBLover]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

That said, if you are controlling hitters yourself, it's possible that your discipline may be better than CPU and you are not swinging (and missing) at good pitches CPU makes. certainly tend to belong to this group.

Last few games I've been disciplined - though my O-Swing is just slightly below MLB average (28% vs 31%).

It's funny, I'm swinging slightly more often than MLB average (49% vs 47%), missing slightly more often (22% vs 20%) but I'm walking more (8.8 vs 7.7) and have K'd just 8%.

Only been a few games (with this team) but it just struck me as a little funny

Fouls have been all over the place the last few - 27% Foul one game, then 19% and lastest 31%.

With Timing/Directional, there are a few ideas that I can think of increasing Ks when you are hitting against CPU:

(1) Do not use contact swing (as a house rule).

(2) Increase Pitch Speed sliders. If you are *not* consistently late and going for the opposite field, I would actually increase Pitch Speed to make your discipline worse (but it would have unfortunate side effect on SB%...). In general, you should set Pitch Speed sliders so that you see slightly more "pull" in batted balls than being late consistently though.

(3) Lower one of Contact/Timing/Foul Frequency. Which slider to lower depends on the detail of how you are not getting K'ed as much, so unless I have some meaningful data to go by I'm not sure which one to adjust.

I might try #3, but I don't want to mess with the batted ball profile, which seems awesome and Contact impacts LD% from what I've read of your findings here? My IFFB% rate is 10.4% (slightly too high) and Choppers are really getting on my nerves lol, but that might even out.

Speaking BIP profile...my hitters have been flyball hitters in my Rockies franchise. Coors effect as the last few games have been at home? I'm at 41% FB rate recently and it's come at the expense of grounders. I don't influence often (and a lot of times when I influence "up" I get grounders anyway, and I influenced "down" with Panik...and he hit a fly to CF lol)

As for pitching to CPU, it's possible you are pitching to the strike zone more than you should, if you are going for K's. I would take a look at strike % and see if you are around 64% consistently. If your strike % is much higher (like 70%), you are trading Ks for pitching to contact; if you are much lower then you might be nibbling too much. That's the first thing I would look at.

I think for me - and perhaps because of my pitchers' control ratings (most of them are under 55), it seems that when I want to throw "true balls", they end up hittable in the zone and when I throw in the zone, it ends up....hittable in the zone...

For some reason, they aren't missing OUT of the zone like for the CPU. CPU pitchers are almost right on with strike %.

[nomo17k]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

...

I might try #3, but I don't want to mess with the batted ball profile, which seems awesome and Contact impacts LD% from what I've read of your findings here? My IFFB% rate is 10.4% (slightly too high) and Choppers are really getting on my nerves lol, but that might even out.

Speaking BIP profile...my hitters have been flyball hitters in my Rockies franchise. Coors effect as the last few games have been at home? I'm at 41% FB rate recently and it's come at the expense of grounders. I don't influence often (and a lot of times when I influence "up" I get grounders anyway, and I influenced "down" with Panik...and he hit a fly to CF lol)

The game is in general fly ball happy. I don't know why but even at default there are a few % more fly balls than in real-life MLB.

I think swing influence (as in Directional) tries to place PCI so that more of hit types you desire could be produced, but the pitch location and timing are still significant factors. If you are very early on a pitch, you tend to hit a grounder on the pull side, and if you are very late, then you tend to fly/pop out on the opposite side. You cannot override some aspects of hitting like those by using Directional.

I think for me - and perhaps because of my pitchers' control ratings (most of them are under 55), it seems that when I want to throw "true balls", they end up hittable in the zone and when I throw in the zone, it ends up....hittable in the zone...

...

I don't think the game "tries" to concentrate pitches toward the middle of the strike zone, but there might be some tendency for the game to not allow pitching around in certain ways.

For example, when I throw curveball low, I often want to bounce it (rather than hanging it), but even if I place the pitch marker to the lowest, I still cannot command it low enough so that it won't have a chance to become a strike.

Perhaps curveball might be an exception (as some people online exploit those "dirtballs"), but in this game it is definitely more difficult to create pitchers who are very wild and issue tons of walks. Pitchers usually are not wild enough even with BB/9 = 0, and also CPU hitters don't take an approach where they let pitchers walk themselves out of the mound.

[KBLover]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

The game is in general fly ball happy. I don't know why but even at default there are a few % more fly balls than in real-life MLB.

Maybe it's how they try to keep hits in line? FBs have the worst BABIP of any hit type (and pop ups are almost guaranteed outs barring fluke errors or such) so maybe this is how the default engine tries to keep hits in line?

I don't think the game "tries" to concentrate pitches toward the middle of the strike zone, but there might be some tendency for the game to not allow pitching around in certain ways.

For example, when I throw curveball low, I often want to bounce it (rather than hanging it), but even if I place the pitch marker to the lowest, I still cannot command it low enough so that it won't have a chance to become a strike.

Perhaps curveball might be an exception (as some people online exploit those "dirtballs"), but in this game it is definitely more difficult to create pitchers who are very wild and issue tons of walks. Pitchers usually are not wild enough even with BB/9 = 0, and also CPU hitters don't take an approach where they let pitchers walk themselves out of the mound.

Yep - I'm the same way with the curves. About the only time they DO go in the dirt is if I'm aiming for the zone down and they miss low. But usually they miss higher (perhaps like you say, some built-in check to kept dirt curves from happening too much in PvP).

Sliders are a bit easier to bury though they tend to be ridiculously wild to the outside. Splitters and forkballs are easy to bury too. Change ups I would put in the curveball camp. They like to miss high like curves for some reason (maybe the same reason)?

[BigOrangeVol4Life]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Nomo, between MLB The Show 13, 14, 15, and now 16, which version was the toughest to nail down in terms of finding the best slider set?

Are you anticipating any gameplay patch to be released soon for MLBTS 16 that might help you out?

[nomo17k]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Maybe it's how they try to keep hits in line? FBs have the worst BABIP of any hit type (and pop ups are almost guaranteed outs barring fluke errors or such) so maybe this is how the default engine tries to keep hits in line?

...

I don't think that's the reason... BABIP and line drive % (and there batting average) are clearly down, so it doesn't make sense to keep the number of safe hits in check by keeping them low.

One thing, though, is how the game identify hit type is not exactly the same as how other baseball stats tracking shops do it. Someone's line drive might be identified as a fly ball in the game, vice versa. So they don't have to exactly align to each other, but the game still is often fly ball happy for some reason...

Nomo, between MLB The Show 13, 14, 15, and now 16, which version was the toughest to nail down in terms of finding the best slider set?

Are you anticipating any gameplay patch to be released soon for MLBTS 16 that might help you out?

As far as slider adjustments, all games are about equal in difficulty of making adjustment... but I think 13 and 15 were pretty close to the target stats already out of the box, so it was easier in a sense that I didn't have to make a lot of wild adjustments (like this year and in 14)... but it usually takes a roughly similar amount of time getting all the games played to check numbers. But I also have to say I'm often a bit too careful.


I don't expect patches to fix gameplay balance issues. I wish they do for some of near "game-breaking" issues but I haven't seen them patched "well enough" before. So if we have some parts of the game not so well balanced, we are usually stuck with them for the year. The devs might improve, but often not really go so far as to fix those things. I think they don't want to break other things and make things worse, trying to fix one thing in a short time.

That's one reason I really don't like the yearly cycle for the sports games. It's really only for marketing purposes that game developers do this (to be in sync with seasonal pro sports), but I personally don't really care that much about the game fully in sync with the pro sports, though I know I'm in a minority...

They should really have two branches of development... a long-term new features branch (which roughly corresponds to the dev cycle we see today) and "current" branch that gets all the fixes and minor improvement in (which also get merged to the long term branch). A whole lot of recent software development follows such a model, and I think it works better for users.

[Manning18]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

This may be a really dumb question but if I'm starting a CPU vs CPU franchise today which set would you recommend using? 4/24 or what you're testing now?

Thanks and great work

[nomo17k]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

This may be a really dumb question but if I'm starting a CPU vs CPU franchise today which set would you recommend using? 4/24 or what you're testing now?

Thanks and great work

This is actually a difficult question to answer, because so far I'm getting a little conflicting result from the changes that I made...

Between the two sets (4/24 and 4/26), the main changes were Pitcher Consistency 3 (from 4) and Solid Hits 6 (from 5). I was hoping that would ever so slightly increase walks and batting average (or BABIP/LD%), but I'm not really getting much of either... instead I'm seeing a little Of course I'm not using the same pitchers and teams this time (more aces with 4/24, more mid rotation guys with 4/26), so they are also factors... of course it's still 25 games, etc., etc.

But if I were to create another stop-gap set from these, I would probably go with 4/26 set with Pitcher Consistency 4. Effectively that's a 4/24 set with a more realistic SB% and a tiny boost to Solid Hits to hopefully help offense a bit.

[nomo17k]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

Here is the "beta" slider set I could personally recommend using right now. At least with these you should be able to get numbers close to you can see in 4/24 and 4/26 sets:

Contact: 7
Power: 5
Timing: 1
Foul Frequency: 2
Solid Hit: 6
Starter Stamina: 5
Reliever Stamina: 5
Pitcher Control: 3
Pitcher Consistency: 4
Strike Frequency: 6
Manager Hook: 5
Pickoffs: 5
Fastball PS: 4
Offspeed PS: 4
Fielding Errors In: 9
Fielding Errors Out: 3
Throwing Errors In: 6
Throwing Errors Out: 8
Fielder Run Speed: 4
Fielder Reaction: 5
Fielder AS In: 4
Fielder AS Out: 5
BR Speed: 5
BR Steal Ability: 9
BR Steal Frequency: 7
Wind: 5
Injury Frequency: 5
Trade Frequency: 5

There may still be a couple tweaks necessary (e.g., I haven't totally nailed down SB% yet), but I expect the rest of adjustments to be of fine-tuning nature... unless I end up seeing surprises here and there.

[KBLover]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

For steals, do you think we'll have to go to 3 FB pitch speed? That wouldn't impact anything else (except the visuals)?

I don't know what they did between MLB15 and 16 but the steals are just...

[rjackson]

Re: Stats-Based CPU Sliders [MLB 16 Version]

In one of the games, Dee Gordon was hitting without a helmet.

I am sure that there is a joke here.