Strat-O-Matic Baseball 365

What's the general consensus? Normal or aggressive?

Depends on if you have a generally fast team or a team of slow sluggers in a HR park. Then you would want to take into account the OF arms of your opponent that night.

Does the OF arm really matter? I don't know but, I assumed that normal meant that you would attempt to advance if say the chance was 1-14 or such. I have always figure my opponents arms would only limit my attempts.
I would think a 1-17 vs a -3 would run as often as a 1-14 vs a 0 arm.

Isn't that how it should work?

Jmb3264 wrote:Does the OF arm really matter? I don't know but, I assumed that normal meant that you would attempt to advance if say the chance was 1-14 or such. I have always figure my opponents arms would only limit my attempts.
I would think a 1-17 vs a -3 would run as often as a 1-14 vs a 0 arm.

Isn't that how it should work?

It should, but does anyone know if it actually does?

STEVE F wrote:

Jmb3264 wrote:Does the OF arm really matter? I don't know but, I assumed that normal meant that you would attempt to advance if say the chance was 1-14 or such. I have always figure my opponents arms would only limit my attempts.
I would think a 1-17 vs a -3 would run as often as a 1-14 vs a 0 arm.

Isn't that how it should work?

It should, but does anyone know if it actually does?

I don't really know for sure - if someone else does, please chime in - but I think that you're correct Steve F. I think that the settings will determine how aggressive HAL will be with base running given the odds in a particular situation.

However, I wonder sometimes if other managers DO adjust the baserunning settings sometimes. For example, if I myself have an outfield with 2 weak arms and 1 good arm, I sometimes think that I notice more outfield assists occuring, perhaps, as other managers "send the runners" more by setting to aggressive - maybe. I don't know for sure.

I DO like to have at least ONE strong arm in the outfield, to keep opposing managers on their toes, so they don't try to run wild. But like you said Steve F, that thinking on my part shouldn't really matter if HAL makes the base running decisions in view of the odds in a particular situation.

Personally, I agree with one of the earlier posts - the strategy should depend on the nature of your own ball club. If it's a homerun oriented club, I set it to normal. If you have a singles oriented club - especially one with good base running and/or poor clutch hitting - then I tend to set it to aggressive. I don't adjust it from game to game. Sometimes if I see that HAL has been sending the catcher running and getting thrown out too often, I'll move it back from aggressive back to normal. But I tend to like to use aggressive baserunning with a singles hitting team.

My point is that SOM is a game of math. Aggressive is not a mindset but, a number. For me my running settings are based 99.8% on my teams build and has almost nothing to do with the arms of my opponents. If I have a high avg low slg team I will turn it up a bit. My opponents arms will not change my strategy. I believe I will end up running more vs weak arms than strong arms with a normal setting but, the odds will be the same per attempt.

Now I am assuming that those settings are not that complicated. I would like to know if normal means go on a 1-14 chance or "go on a 1-14 with 2 outs and a tie score" etc.

When I played live I could be aggressive with a lead conservative if tied or behind. Aggressive if Seaver was beating me 1-0 and I wasn't likely to get another chance, etc.

I hope when and if they update the pref pages--they include the super hal running from the new CD rom versions of the game--it makes the base running settings moot, and allows you to be aggressive with a lead and conservative when behind--which is what any sane manager would do.

That said, for most of my teams (which typically have a mix of fast and slow and average runners) I find aggressive running gets a lot of people thrown out at third, and Normal does not try to take home enough, but Normal is what I use the most-- I will sometimes go aggressive when going into a pitchers park, or if I chose a pitchers park.

I have tried changing running ratings for individual series and this is my thoughts so far, but I an basically a sophomore at this game.

I think moving up a notch (over your season settings) on poor throwing OF's is a mistake overall as hal uses the runners rating + the OF arm added together in each individual running decision anyway--all it accomplishes is sending slower runners more in marginal situations (too much in my opinion)

On the other hand moving up a notch on OF's that make a lot of errors can get some extra bases on throwing errors and I think that is worthwhile.