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Rudy's MLB 12 The Show Slider Thoughts 
Posted on March 10, 2012 at 10:40 AM.
I wanted to post my thoughts on MLB 12 The Show’s sliders and what my early findings are with the default settings and how I’ve tweaked the game to fit more of my style. These thoughts could be used to fine-tune the game the way you want as well, even if you have a different opinion on how to fine-tune the game. Everyone has their own personal preferences both in features and expectations so this is certainly subjective. For me MLB 12 The Show was a little frustrating initially to set up the way I wanted. So many things tie into one another that to adjust one thing you need to adjust something else. I think I’m finally happy with a good base set and these are my thoughts.


HITTING

My personal hitting skills are weak so I slow the pitch speed down to 0. Definitely user preference. Slowing it down helps with walks and turning on fastballs. There are a few sliders in here that can help fine-tune the game the way you want.

Contact – This slider determines the overall ability to make contact with the ball but increasing this also improves your ability to make solid contact so you must be careful with this slider and adjust the Solid Hits slider accordingly.

For the cpu this is a critical slider as it also includes their plate discipline. I wish that was a separate slider. I wanted to increase the cpu contact slider initially to see more regular base hits, mainly singles, but it was a mistake. Boosting this also boosted their HRs which is what I didn’t want. Also the cpu becomes too patient at the plate as you raise the slider and they will not swing at many pitches outside the zone. Real MLB players swing at 30% of the pitches outside the zone (31% outside the zone, 65% inside the zone in 2012) so I would be really hesitant to raise the cpu contact slider above default. If you want to see the cpu chase more pitches drop this slider which appears to be pretty sensitive. One click and you will see significant changes.

Power – This slider simply adjusts the length of your hits. Most people historically have dropped this one notch. It doesn’t affect quality of contact, just the distance of your hits when you do really connect.

Timing – if you are striking out too much or swinging and missing too much boost this slider up. I strike out quite a bit so I boosted it up one notch. This slider will reduce swings and misses and fouls as well but this can be dangerous when boosting for the cpu. You will have to watch your own strikeout rates. If you are striking out too many cpu batters boost the cpu timing a notch but this slider also seems to work too well with only one click. Conversely, drop the cpu timing if you want to get more swings and misses and strikeouts.

Solid Hits – I firmly believe this needs to be dropped a lot. I have it at one (-4) for both myself and the cpu. However this really ties into your pitch control. This slider seems to impact how hard you or the cpu hit mistake pitches. If you keep the pitch control settings high you won’t see many meatball pitches and having a higher number here is fine. But if you reduce the user and cpu pitch control you will definitely have to reduce the solid hit slider unless you love the long ball.

Fouls – I think this is more personal preference and is pretty good at default. How many foul balls do you like to see? If you get annoyed by those long at bats featuring tons of fouled balls you may want to drop this. If anything this is a slider to be used to correct pitch counts. Pitchers average a little over 15 pitches per inning so if you or the cpu are cruising along with low pitch counts you might want to boost this up.

PITCHING

For pitching I believe in less control than most people. I also like to pitch from a zoomed out camera (I use Minny’s broadcast cam) and turn the strike zone off which makes it harder to nibble on the corners. If you like to pitch from a catcher cam and the strike zone on you may want to adjust the control sliders down to compensate.

If you want to issue legitimate walks there are two things you have to do. First, you have to reduce control so the ball doesn’t always go where you want. Second, you have to make the cpu dangerous enough so that you aren’t willing to groove pitches to avoid walks. This is not always easy to fine-tune.

Pitcher Control and Consistency – These two sliders work together. Pitch control determines how close your pitch will hit your intended target while consistency controls how big of a miss it will be. Of course the actual rating of the pitcher affects this along with user input if using meter or pulse. I have always liked reducing pitch control to make it harder to hit my spots. This in turn leads to issuing more walks. Pitch consistency affects how bad your misses are and also affects wild pitches and passed balls. If you drop pitch control you will probably have to raise consistency. While I like not hitting my spots all the time (lower pitch control) I don’t like missing by two feet either so I boost pitch consistency a touch. Right now I have pitch control down to 2 and consistency up to 6. I have a hard time hitting my spots but my misses aren’t too brutal. The one thing missing is I have yet to throw a wild pitch in over 10 games. Maybe I should be flip-flopping these sliders? I may need to experiment more with this but I’m willing to live with no passed balls if it means my pitch control is the way I want.

As for the cpu, I find they throw quite a few wild pitches if I drop their control. If you reduce pitch control for the cpu you almost certainly have to raise their consistency.

Again, your pitching sliders greatly impact the hitting. I would suggest if you aren’t happy with the cpu offense (likely not enough from them) I would experiment first with dropping user pitch control rather than boost the cpu contact or timing sliders. Beware that with less pitch control you will not only issue more walks but also more meatballs down the heart of the plate. If you find you're serving up too many HRs drop the Solid Contact Slider. The pitch control, consistency and Solid Contact slider all need to be adjusted together imo.

Strike Frequency – Pitchers in MLB throw strikes about 62% of the time and that percentage is slightly lower on first pitches but right around 60%. If the cpu is throwing too many strikes, you aren’t getting enough walks and the cpu starting pitcher is hanging around too much you should drop this slider significantly to help out.

Fatigue - The fatigue for pitchers in this game has always been something I’ve adjusted and this year is no different. I find that some starters are completely gassed before 100 pitches so I personally boost starter fatigue one notch as I think they get tired too quick. Of course if you are struggling to get the cpu starter to throw enough pitches you may want to leave this alone or drop it. I also reduce reliever fatigue to one (-4) since I think they should get more tired than they do. Not a big deal but this is a crucial area for season or franchise.


FIELDING AND BASE RUNNING

Fielding and throwing errors. These seem pretty good on default. I normally raised them up a bit in the past but I found with a higher fielding error slider (only 1-2 clicks) I saw 5 fly balls dropped in 8 games. That’s not what I wanted to see so beware of raising that slider. I haven’t seen many throwing errors and those tend to happen more often than booted balls in real MLB so I have raised that slightly.

Run Speed - If you want to see more balls land safely in gaps or over the outfielders heads drop run speed. This is better than past years but it’s also something that most slider guys drop and I don’t think this year is any different. It’s very rare to see anyone raise this slider.


Reaction time – is mainly tuned for the infield imo. If you want to see more balls get between the infielders or down the lines then drop this slider like myself. Most slider people either leave this at default or drop it. It’s very rare to see anyone raise this slider.


Arm strength - is too strong at default imo. I mainly judge this based on the outfielders’ ability to get the ball in too quickly to prevent hits down the line from turning into doubles. At default I threw out David Ortiz at 1B on a hard shot to RF. That may not be that out of line and it can be argued that its bush league to even attempt to throw someone out at 1B from RF but it should certainly be hard to do. I’ve reduced arm strength to 3 and have still thrown at least two runners out at home trying to score from 2nd on a single.

Base Stealing Ability – after I stole second base easily with Alex Avila and seeing every base stealer steal successfully I dropped this one notch. Catchers only throw out 30% or less of base stealers (Yadier Molina is over 40% normally while Victor Martinez only threw out 13% one year – that’s why he moved to DH) so you should expect many successful swipes but at default it’s almost like stealing in Little League – too easy. I’ve got it at four (-1) and have thrown out one runner so far. It may have to drop one more.

Those are all my personal slider thoughts on MLB 12 The Show. While we each have personal preferences hopefully these may help you fine-tune the game the way you want.

My personal slider set is here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...rYlg4OGc#gid=0
Comments
# 1 $NevaBroke$ @ Mar 13
i will give these sliders a shot. i work a lot, so I don't have time to tweak sliders and i appreciate the work you put in to get these. i used OSFM sliders last year, but just did not get the enjoyment that i was looking for. i felt like my hitting was horrible and i felt more lucky when winning games than giving the cpu a good game. i will be putting more time in this year on mlb12. i am a football junkie who has started really getting into baseball over the last 5 years. i now understand the game is all about pitching duels and match ups. if you know your team and your opponents strengths and weaknesses you can really dominate. i still need help with understanding specific pitcher pitch sequences based off particular players against strike/ball counts and vice versa. i am soo hungry to really learn the game of baseball inside out, but not sure where or what to eat. any suggestions that would help me get better would be appreciated. i will post my thoughts on your sliders soon, thanks!
 
# 2 NAFBUC @ Mar 30
Thanks for your slider thoughts and definitions. I also like your stats that reinforce the slider adjustment recommendations.

I would still like to see a greater 'variance' from 1 to 10 and separate sliders for infielders and outfielders.
 
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