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Post by Scott on Feb 19, 2010 19:27:31 GMT -5
As opposed to the playoff contest, I am not sure if these items should be kept around or not.
If I were to keep one, it would be the article bonus as I think that is the only item here that people actually need to be pushed to do. I think trading would continue as normal with or without a bonus. No one completes a trade so they can get paid a $250K bonus. That is absurd. The voting bonus is another item I am up in the air on as it adds another dimension to the league, but I think the same people who vote now will still vote with or without a bonus.
The real factor to consider in all of this is the fact that if we got rid of the bonuses, I would no longer have to go into League Editor unless we had a new owner and I was changing the owner's name. This would mean the farm grades should stay equal at the beginning of the year instead of getting jacked up for the first month every season.
In order to make sure that I would 100% never have to go into League Editor, we would also have to agree on a rule that cash can only be traded in $500K multiples as the game can only trade cash like that. Otherwise, I have to go in manually and edit the cash when someone only trades $100K, etc.
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Post by Paul - Jays GM on Feb 19, 2010 20:41:19 GMT -5
sounds good - the fewer times you have to go into the league editor, the better!
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Post by Mosko on Feb 19, 2010 21:12:37 GMT -5
For the majority of our owners, who are really interested in what goes on in the league, I don't think the bonuses for voting or writing articles make any difference. I know it won't make any difference to me. I'll still vote on the league awards and I'll still write the occasional article. And I'm fairly certain that nobody makes a trade just because of the trading bonus.
So I'd be fine with eliminating all of these.
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Post by sj on Feb 20, 2010 14:15:37 GMT -5
I think award voting bonuses can go, but not the article or trading bonuses. Some owners will keep doing articles, others will stop or write fewer. Every article is board activity that can also promote more activity from replies to it, so every article we lose will result in less activity. Board activity helps sell perspective owners on joining a league. The trading bonus was never meant to promote trading, it was meant to help balance things between owners who can write creatively and active owners who can't, or aren't comfortable doing it. It's not fair that an owner can do nothing with his team, but gets a bonus for writing articles, and an owner who makes trades but doesn't write articles gets nothing. That was the point of this bonus. The real factor to consider in all of this is the fact that if we got rid of the bonuses, I would no longer have to go into League Editor unless we had a new owner and I was changing the owner's name. This would mean the farm grades should stay equal at the beginning of the year instead of getting jacked up for the first month every season. This is not correct. Last I saw, you're still sitting on the fence about eliminating points. To do points conversions, you have to go into the league editor. Even if you eliminate points, you'll still have to go into the league editor for the cash cap. You're going to have to use the league editor no matter what we do about bonuses, unless you eliminate points and get rid of the cash cap too.
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Post by Paul - Jays GM on Feb 20, 2010 14:39:51 GMT -5
I was under the assumption that eliminating the points would go along with eliminating the cash cap.
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Post by Scott on Feb 20, 2010 15:27:32 GMT -5
I think award voting bonuses can go, but not the article or trading bonuses. Some owners will keep doing articles, others will stop or write fewer. Every article is board activity that can also promote more activity from replies to it, so every article we lose will result in less activity. Board activity helps sell perspective owners on joining a league. The trading bonus was never meant to promote trading, it was meant to help balance things between owners who can write creatively and active owners who can't, or aren't comfortable doing it. It's not fair that an owner can do nothing with his team, but gets a bonus for writing articles, and an owner who makes trades but doesn't write articles gets nothing. That was the point of this bonus. The people who are currently writing articles and have been writing articles for years are going to continue to write articles whether they are paid or not. These owners have long been the top owners in the league and the most active owners in the league. These are the same owners that are going to vote whether they are paid or not. They are also the same owners that continually contribute to these dicussions whereas others do not. They will continue to write articles because they enjoy it and they enjoy the league. With all the cash in the league currently, I can't imagine an owner goes and writes an article so he can earn a measley $500K extra each article. Maybe I am completely missing the boat on that one, but I doubt it. Therefore, if you eliminate the article bonus, there is also no need for the trading bonus to try and even out non active owners and active owners. Last I saw, you're still sitting on the fence about eliminating points. To do points conversions, you have to go into the league editor. Even if you eliminate points, you'll still have to go into the league editor for the cash cap. You're going to have to use the league editor no matter what we do about bonuses, unless you eliminate points and get rid of the cash cap too. I am not sitting on the fence at all. I thought I said in one of those e-mails that points are on their way out, but maybe I didn't. That is why I didn't start a discussion thread on them. Based on the analysis you sent me and my own analysis, I think it is a necessary step to try and have the game even out the cash in the league instead of us. You make a very good point about the cash cap. I hadn't thought about that. I would still need to go into league editor to move teams that went over $150M back to $150M. However, maybe we can find a way around that. At the beginning of every season, I could keep track of how much cash should be eliminated and post it to the boards. This would cause the team to continue building cash in the game, but some of it is actually "fake" cash. This would hopefully cause the game to continue to penalize that team for having too much cash and it would be harder and harder to make money. For example, the Braves have $200M at the end of 1983. I post to the boards that $50M of Braves cash does not exist. Then at the end of 1984, the Braves have $220M in cash. This would result in $20M more of cash not existing ($220M-50M=$170M which is $20M eliminated). Obviously, this could get very complicated after a number of years like this. I would have to get a spreadsheet and maybe link it to the boards so that it could be formula driven. Do you think that would have any effect?
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Post by OriolesGM on Feb 20, 2010 16:31:08 GMT -5
Some thoughts.....
In response to the cash cap issue, and with the elimination of points, aren't we now moving towards a salary cap. If the game penalizes teams with high cash balances by negatively impacting their revenue streams, the cash cap issue will take care of itself.
The other issue would then be payroll limits, since teams that are temporarily awash in cash could astronomically boost their payroll for a season or two. This would only be temporary, as the cash would get used up. But it could prove to be an issue, especially if teams trade players for alot of cash deals.
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Post by Exposgm on Feb 20, 2010 18:31:09 GMT -5
In order to make sure that I would 100% never have to go into League Editor, we would also have to agree on a rule that cash can only be traded in $500K multiples as the game can only trade cash like that. Otherwise, I have to go in manually and edit the cash when someone only trades $100K, etc. Not exactly. If a team trades $100k in a deal, you manually select $500k, then you replace the 5 by a 1, or whatever number it might be. In fact, you can change any number, the cash traded can be $750. It worked this way in the 2k8 and seems to work too in the 2k10 from what I can see.
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Post by boobiegibson4three on Feb 20, 2010 19:04:36 GMT -5
we should not get rid of a cap even with the go away of points. We should just keep it at 150million cash.
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Post by Paul - Jays GM on Feb 20, 2010 20:34:07 GMT -5
why? if someone wants to horde 300M in cash, let them. The game will adjust by having players demand higher salaries and make it much harder to keep fans in the seats. Let the game handle the issue of cash and make it one less hassle for the league commish to keep track of and maintain.
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Post by boobiegibson4three on Feb 21, 2010 3:06:43 GMT -5
b/c i dont think its fun for a team to only send 20 million oin salary and save up a shit load of money and then spend 100 million in one off season...not fun (at least for me)
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Post by johnnyboy on Feb 21, 2010 8:18:40 GMT -5
I agree with you Brad, some teams will pile up a LOT of money while they hibernate awaiting for better moment. The cash cap encourage owners to balance their budget. Personally I think it's a step foward for the health of the league
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Post by sj on Feb 21, 2010 13:37:40 GMT -5
This would cause the team to continue building cash in the game, but some of it is actually "fake" cash. This would hopefully cause the game to continue to penalize that team for having too much cash and it would be harder and harder to make money. Obviously, this could get very complicated after a number of years like this. I would have to get a spreadsheet and maybe link it to the boards so that it could be formula driven. Do you think that would have any effect? Complicated, as you said, and also the wrong effect. Doing the fake cash thing, not only would teams still lose use of money over 150M, but they, and the rest of the league, will also be penalized for the fake money they can't use, but the game believes they have since it's in their cash column. Nobody cares, it seems, if high cash teams' attendance goes into the toilet, but I don't think they realize that their own teams, all teams, are going to be circling the bowl right behind them. Something else that must be considered is that we may be making too many changes at once.If you only eliminate points, teams will have lower attendance and less money to spend. If you only get rid of bonuses and chop down the contest, teams will less extra money, and also higher payrolls. Buy downs are gone, so payrolls are going up even more on most teams, and people don't have anyplace to put any overflow cash they might still make. That means less cash out of pocket at one time, but more cash out of pocket every season. It also means that a way of lowering league wide cash is gone. Eliminating buy downs not only effects the teams that used them, it also effects the teams that trade with the teams that used them - salaries are going to be higher than they used to be. We all have to remember that every proposed change is based on how things are right now, and that right now includes teams having been able to buy salaries down, not how things will be after each change, because we don't have that information yet. We really need to see the effect of each of these things separately before deciding to do all of them. At most, we can only afford to implement two of these changes before we stop and look at the impact it's going to have. Waiting two or three seasons to see the effect of disallowing buy downs and eliminating points is a reasonable start. More than that, or doing it faster, is only asking for trouble.
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Post by Exposgm on Feb 22, 2010 19:28:37 GMT -5
Eliminating bonuses completely may not only affect things the way Rand described it, but could lead to a decrease of overall league activity. Not all owners write articles or make trades for bonuses, but some do. It's not the reason why they do it that matters: it's the fact that they do it.
If we turn the league into a boring place only because we felt it would be easier to no longer pay any bonuses, it's not going to be a step forward. League activity has been the key to TMBL's success over the years. Eliminate bonuses? Why not reduce them instead, or cap them?
Teams having too much cash may be a problem that needs to be addressed otherwise. Why not force spending where we can? We're all equalized in Expenses, but equalized at ZERO. We can play with that, decide that we'll stay equalized but that every team will spend x millions in Farm, Scouting and Medical. Just there, we have an option of forcing teams to pay for something, and to take out some of the cash they have.
We can also decide of a fixed fee, and charge everyteam a fixed amount. Call it whatever you want. Everyone pays an annual fee for just owning a team in TMBL. Whatever. It's not like we don't have any flexibility.
Sure, it's a good idea to try and reduce the number of times you have to go in League Editor. Taking out the buydowns is a huge step towards that goal. But you may still need to go into League Editor, more than you probably thought. Just think about Stadium Changes. A team pays to bring changes to its stadium; you need to go into League Editor for that to happen. Are we going to forbid stadium changes just for that? Or make them free? And if the stadium changes bug that we used to have in the 2k8 is still around? You would not only need to take out some cash in order to pay for the changes: you'd need to boost the team's cash to build an entirely new stadium only so the game can save those changes beyond the current season.
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Post by boobiegibson4three on Feb 22, 2010 20:23:40 GMT -5
also with the scouting/minor leagues/medical we could make it an escalating rule... next year 1 million on alll three equaling 3 million.... next year 1.5 million equaling 4.5 million then maybe 2 million...then keep it there for a season and see if we need to keep going up
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Post by Scott on Feb 22, 2010 20:48:35 GMT -5
Eliminating bonuses completely may not only affect things the way Rand described it, but could lead to a decrease of overall league activity. Not all owners write articles or make trades for bonuses, but some do. It's not the reason why they do it that matters: it's the fact that they do it. I have no doubt that the current league activity will continue with or without bonuses. It is only a handful of owners that currently write articles, and I know they will continue to write articles regardless of whether they are paid or not. I do not believe getting rid of bonuses would do a single thing to league activity. The rest of the league has been dead on this aspect of the game for a long long time and nothing is going to revive that. As far as trading: please. If anyone has completed a trade simply because they were going to get a 250K bonus, they should have their head examined. Trades are done to fill needs on the two teams involved. A 250K bonus not being there anymore is not going to stop two teams from completing a trade. And before you come back and say in a few seasons that trading has rapidly decreased and link it to the bonus not being there anymore: I do expect trading to rapidly decrease in the coming seasons. This is due to what I have talked about before with team rosters being very large and most needs on most teams are already filled. With less needs, you are going to have less trades being completed. Teams having too much cash may be a problem that needs to be addressed otherwise. Why not force spending where we can? We're all equalized in Expenses, but equalized at ZERO. We can play with that, decide that we'll stay equalized but that every team will spend x millions in Farm, Scouting and Medical. Just there, we have an option of forcing teams to pay for something, and to take out some of the cash they have. If Farm, Scouting, and Medical are set at ANYTHING but zero, we are no longer equalized. The game is built that way, and there is nothing we can do about it. We went through this back when we changed everything to 0. You know that as well as anyone else. Sure, it's a good idea to try and reduce the number of times you have to go in League Editor. Taking out the buydowns is a huge step towards that goal. But you may still need to go into League Editor, more than you probably thought. Just think about Stadium Changes. A team pays to bring changes to its stadium; you need to go into League Editor for that to happen. Are we going to forbid stadium changes just for that? Or make them free? And if the stadium changes bug that we used to have in the 2k8 is still around? You would not only need to take out some cash in order to pay for the changes: you'd need to boost the team's cash to build an entirely new stadium only so the game can save those changes beyond the current season. Yeah, that is another area where I would have to manually adjust the cash level. I think though that it takes me clicking around quite a few times in League Editor for the grades to get really out of whack. If we can reduce it to just a few times here and there, I don't think the impact will be as large as it currently is when I have to go through every team to manually edit their cash due to bonuses.
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Post by Paul - Jays GM on Feb 22, 2010 23:11:32 GMT -5
If Farm, Scouting, and Medical are set at ANYTHING but zero, we are no longer equalized. The game is built that way, and there is nothing we can do about it. We went through this back when we changed everything to 0. You know that as well as anyone else. Well, we could have an amount for medical spending, if we set the medical staff effect to -100%, it would not matter if that aspect was not equalized.
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Post by Scott on Mar 15, 2010 13:13:20 GMT -5
Voting bonuses are going to be eliminated, but the voting for awards will continue. I think we will get the same type of response with or without a bonus because it is usually only the highly interested owners who respond anyway.
Also, this season has confirmed my belief about article bonuses. Almost no one writes articles anymore. And those that do write them are going to write them regardless of whether they get a tiny bonus or not. Therefore, we are also going to eliminate the article bonus.
Since the article bonus is being eliminated, that also means the trading bonus is being eliminated as the main point of this bonus was to offset the article bonus for non-writing teams.
I am not saying these things are going to be gone for good. There may come a day when we need to infuse more cash into the league and these can be brought back, but we are no where near that point right now.
These changes will go into effect for the 1983 season.
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Post by sj on Mar 28, 2010 11:12:23 GMT -5
Voting bonuses are going to be eliminated,... These changes will go into effect for the 1983 season.Are voting bonuses going to be paid for the upcoming ballots this off season? Just want to see if I read this right.
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Post by Scott on Mar 28, 2010 12:24:32 GMT -5
Yes, this is the last season for bonuses to be paid.
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