Entirely Fictional vs. ANY type of import

[JB44]

I've been sitting on the sidelines and waiting to begin playing this game. I've owned the fulll version for a while now. It's just .. after reading all these things ... I don't want to get in to something deep before it's entirely cooked.

So ..

Are you of the opinion that with PureSim Baseball ..

An entirely fictional league, top to bottom, has a much better chance at simulating a good, true experience than any type of actual MLB import?

Should PureSim, at this point, be experienced as a fictional players only baseball simulator? Or are the problems being discussed across the board and will effect fictional as well as historical?

[SittingDuck]

Yes, definitely.  Fictional was, after all, the original scope of the game when first created.  So it is where it excels.

[Nukester]

ORIGINAL: SittingDuck

Yes, definitely.  Fictional was, after all, the original scope of the game when first created.  So it is where it excels.

"

Historicals are nice but there is alot of editing involved if you want a close to reality alternative "what if" scenario, but yes, fictionals are much smoother since thats what the game is really designed around.

[Abev]

ORIGINAL: JB44

An entirely fictional league, top to bottom, has a much better chance at simulating a good, true experience than any type of actual MLB import?

Should PureSim, at this point, be experienced as a fictional players only baseball simulator? Or are the problems being discussed across the board and will effect fictional as well as historical?

YES!

Way back I avoided PureSim because there was not a "real" player option. Now that there is I could care less.

I dont want taint a real players career with what happens in PureSim. I dont want to go in with expectations of a real player, only to not have him meet thoses expectations.

IMO Fictional is the way to go. I am probably in the minority on this one b/c theres always been a great interest in it.

I couldnt be happier with fictional players who create their own identity. For the instant gratification types, its a little more work to get to know the fictional players, but after about 2 seasons you know who everyone is.

More or less the same thing with real players when they dont live up to their real stats or perform way beyond them.

[akw4572]

Fictional is better for me, because it gets rid of preconceived notions of player X should be good because he hit 45 hr's in real life that year. But to each his own.

[Nomo Ootp]

I only play fictionals but have been looking at bringing in a few historical players in the mix.  This does not work well in this game though because of the way the players are brought into the game.  But fictional is the way to go.  I have played sims since the 1960's and the problem with using "real" players is that you expect the "real" results.  This is not really simulation, but replication.  If you like this then the game of choice should be DMB, which is the best seasonal replay game in the market, but very expensive to purchase all the annual disks.

I have played OOTP since version 2, and tried Puresim when it first came out.  I use to follow Shauns blog about the development of the game prior to him putting out his first version and was really into it.  I think that games like OOTP and Puresim are great for the fictional world and have a little bit too much work involved to get them to replicate historical players and teams but a lot of players of the game just can't get by the fact of using "fake" players.   After a while you know the players and "David Hall of the Chicago Arrows" was a great player, at least for me.[;)]

Overall I guess it is a preference that each individual needs to make on there own, but fictionals rule!!!!

[Nukester]

ORIGINAL: Abev

ORIGINAL: JB44

An entirely fictional league, top to bottom, has a much better chance at simulating a good, true experience than any type of actual MLB import?

Should PureSim, at this point, be experienced as a fictional players only baseball simulator? Or are the problems being discussed across the board and will effect fictional as well as historical?

YES!
IMO Fictional is the way to go. I am probably in the minority on this one b/c theres always been a great interest in it.

There is a poll at one of the other baseball sim sites, and out of 87 replies, 24 are historical players, 48 play fictional, and 15 play current day rosters. Fictional leagues are very popular and everyone says once you try one you wont go back.

Ive tried hundreds of fictional leagues and just can not get into them. Id rather take the real players and play an alternate "what-if" scenario with an initial draft and amateur draft and see what happens. As long as the league totals for each season are relatively close to reality, I dont care how the individual performances are.

My most ambitious league I run (very anal about keeping things straight with this one), has simulated from 1903-1934 and by using the ERA Calculator, I have had all stats within 5% of real life. Even so, Ive had some "different" development of some players. Frankie Frisch developed into a big HR and SB guy (in real life he didnt hit many HR's) and has won 4 MVP awards (I think...maybe only 3). I also had a pitcher named Rube Kroh become my leagues all-time greatest SP. In real life he had good stats, but only pitched for like 2 years before quitting for some reason (I cant find a reason that he left the league when he had such good numbers). Babe Ruth is finishing his career and he just passed the 500 HR mark (he was a pitcher until the All-Star Break of 1918 when I turned him into an OF). His HR totals are so low because he is playing for the Cinicinnati Reds and Crosley Field has a HR rating of like .800 (or something very low like that). Thoses are the things I like to see with real players.

[33sherman]

ORIGINAL: Nukester

Babe Ruth is finishing his career and he just passed the 500 HR mark (he was a pitcher until the All-Star Break of 1918 when I turned him into an OF). His HR totals are so low because he is playing for the Cinicinnati Reds and Crosley Field has a HR rating of like .800 (or something very low like that).

Did you edit Ruth into a hitter or were you able to force retire, then re-import him?

[Nukester]

I edited him into a hitter. I imported him into a different league to see what his ratings were, then edited them within the game. This wasnt with PureSim though, and I am using a career average version of the database.

Im tryng to develope a career avg database that will work with PureSim, but am still struggling through the tables trying to get the structures for the Access version of the Lahman DB (Im used to modifying the .csv version which appears to be a little more forgiving when modifying)

[BauerPower]

I have tried both fictional and historical. I can see that in fictional eventually a name recognition develops in our minds for the fictional superstar Joe Schmoe. But I always have gotten into my historical associations more.

Baseball is about history and about the names, those glorious names of the past. I never saw Shoeless Joe play (except the right handed version in Field of Dreams), but there is something about having a Shoeless Joe Jackson on your team with his actual picture and a tab that has his actual stats (a fabulous feature by the way that blows the other games away for me). If a person understands that the game doesn't know Shoeless Joe from Joe Charboneau and that he could easily have 4000 hits or he could have 400 and if they realize it's not a historical replay: then historical associations are great. With historical you get so many what-ifs (the comparisons) that add so much intrigue to the game.

I love baseball, always have, but here in Southern Alberta they have a team in the Northern Baseball League called the Calgary Vipers and their games are on the radio all the time. When the game comes on I switch off the radio, who cares about players named Manabu Kuramochi or Jeff Butts. To me, fictional leagues are like following the Calgary Vipers. Even if I paid attention to them, in the back of my mind there is always the thought that these are not major leaguers. Sure they may hit .330 and hit 40 homers, but it is not the major leagues.

[Amaroq]

I've really enjoyed both styles of play. My current association is fictional, and by the third or fourth season the fictional players do, as Bauer suggested, have a 'superstar' name recognition: I'm terrified when sluggers who have dominated my team in past years come to the plate, and I've a strong affinity for some of my long-term players.

However, I also greatly enjoyed my last historical association, starting in 1901 and seeing how far I could get. I only knew the names 'Honus Wagner' and 'Cy Young', so most of the rest of the league might as well have been fictional to me - but I learned a lot about them, and the era, and absolutely loved that style of play - so the next association I start will be historical, looking to take advantage of the new 'early import' feature.

I don't think, at this point, that one experience surpasses the other - they're different. The only thing you'd want to understand about historical play is that that it isn't a historical recreation, its an alternate history, and every decision is going to have repercussions. If you have, say, Dave Winfield on your team in 1972, and you bury him in the A minor-league club, and make sure there are other outfielders on the team so that he's sharing playing time... he's *never* going to develop into a quality major-leaguer - and that's your fault, not the game's. [;)] Likewise, injuries may stunt growth, or players whose careers were cut short with injuries may not get hurt - basically, by May 1st of the first season, all bets are off!

[SittingDuck]

What *he* said - each type of assn has strengths that the other doesn't necessarily have.  And you enjoy each for that.

[KG Erwin]

I agree with the immersion that using real players provides. I tried the fictional approach, but it didn't appeal to me.
 
 As a wargamer, playing from a historical starting point, and then letting your decision-making take history into a different direction is the raison d'etre for our peculiar hobby.
 
As for baseball, I, too, am enamored of its history, but others have described the fascination much better than I have. 
 
For me, and my favorite era, I've developed an affinity towards certain players, and even when playing with historical rosters, I try to trade for these guys.
 
There are two in particular, great all-around players with good hitting abilities, speed, and excellent defense  -- 2B Red Schoendienst and 3B George Kell. 
 
As for pitchers, I really have an attachment to Ralph Branca -- in 1946, he was a 20-year old with great potential, and he became a good pitcher with the Dodgers.
Unfortunately, he will forever be associated with the "shot heard round the world" in 1951, when he gave up a homer to Bobby Thomson in the NL playoff game. 
 
Depending on how the ratings are set, these are three guys I always try to acquire for my Pirates. 
 
Here's the thing -- my self-appointed mission is to get a World Series victory for Pittsburgh before 1960, and break the stranglehold that the New York teams held for most of the "Golden Age".  [;)]

[SittingDuck]

Down with New York!! [:D]

[thesetter]

Being brand new to PureSim, I find this thread extremely interesting.  My first experience with board games was APBA in the early sixties so I lean towards historical simming.  I have played Ootp,FoF and several basketball games that had the option of fictional or historical and could never get into the fictional ones.  Based on the comments in this thread it is obvious that historical replays do not give the same results DMB or Action would give.  But some responses indicate that there might be ways of enhancing the historical experience without the expectation of complete realism. Any tips would be appreciated as I am in the 4th year of a replay that starts in '59 and I seem to be stockpiling great players with less then great results.
Now one unrelated question, is there a way to see the results of the draft?  
 

[Nukester]

ORIGINAL: SittingDuck

Down with New York!! [:D]

[:-]

[Tanaka]

I play with the 70 man association. This way I get all the historical players plus fictional ones. Its the best of both worlds. I get the history and I get the fantasy...

[Nukester]

ORIGINAL: thesetter

Now one unrelated question, is there a way to see the results of the draft?  

While the season is still going (or in the offseason in between seasons) you can see the draft results for an initial draft, the amateur draft, or an expansion draft by going to the "Deals / Moves" page and choosing them from teh drop down list. The only problem with this is that its not really a draft results list, but a draft signing results page, which makes it a bit cumbersome. Im not even entirely sure tha tthe list goes in order of picks.

I dont think there is a way to see past drafts in the Almanac, but it certainly should be there. Great idea to add to the list of future enhancements

[henry296]

You can see past drafts by going to Statistics/Reports and then Misc. Reports.  The entire Amatuer Draft history is available.

[KG Erwin]

ORIGINAL: Nukester

ORIGINAL: SittingDuck

Down with New York!! [:D]

[:-]

I Love it. Damn Yankees. My response -- Bill Mazeroski, bottom of the 9th at Forbes Field in 1960.