Only in this STUPID game ...

STEVESTEFFANNI-
thanks for sharing your thoughts, good points. And congrats on your rings, way to go!!!
Please don't get me wrong, I do not have slam dunk proof of anything because customers do not have access to the STRAT programming, and since Bernie went off the boards, we get no info on these kinds of things from STRAT. I sure do want STRAT to be successful, as I love this game.
We have a done a lot of data collecting, and the things we have pointed out here perhaps have an explanation, we just don't what it is or what the cause is
What we are asking for is transparency, which I don't believe is unreasonable.
And I visa vie this thread, I have learned things I did not know (and I have been playing this game since ATG1!!)---that there is a clutch factor for pitchers (anybody have this and care to share?) and that there info on the doubles/triples rating for each stadium (once again, anybody care to share?).

So, I have a question for MAXPOWER:
At what point, i.e. with 100+ win teams, that have a playoff record similar to NEVDULLY's, which is 1-25, how many more owners with similar records would it take for you to say hmmm, maybe there is something going on here....would it be 2...or 3...or 5...how many ? Asking for a friend......

MtheB....FYI...in my 23 completed leagues there was only 1 team that won more than 100gms!----I beat him in the semi finals after he had beaten me 9 out of 12 gms in the regular season and I won the ring with a Wild Card team in a 80 Mil league with a 75.3 Mil team! It was my 2nd of 3 rings.

STEVENSTEFFANNI--
Nevdully can tell you all about that---having 100 win teams that come up against a team in the playoffs that he has dominated during the season, and then gets nailed in the playoffs.....over and over again...

We also heard from the powers that be for about 2 years *assuring us time and time again* that no home run normalization feature existed, when one of our own, Treyomo, use his own $$$ and ran his own controlled private league, and proved to them and the community that *it was on*.

I don't know what "home run normalization" is supposed to be but from what little I know about statistical significance, I highly doubt that its existence could be proven or disproven by a single league.

When working on BPv2 Bernie said he found one feature *on that was supposed to be *off...and one feature that he said "worked in complete opposite of what is was intended to do"

Stuff like this about coding errors is much easier for me to believe than Strat intentionally constructing double-secret black box rules and then lying about their existence. Strat has an entire help page devoted to which black box rules are operative, no one has yet explained why these rumored settings would be intentionally omitted from the page where the actual max rules are described.

I don't know MaxPower from Austin Powers but Treyomo set up ONE LEAGUE, I believe in Max HR parks, with Top hitters going up against nickel scrub pitching...and almost every hitter's Pct of HRs hit, flattened out right around game 120ish...THAT SINGLE LEAGUE got Bernie to finally open up the game to take a closer look and they he finally admitted that yes "normalization was, in fact happening"...so maybe MaxPowers can rethink what can be determined from a single league.

And as far as ANY other things that may or may not happen...UNLESS MaxPower sat down and had lunch with Bernie TWICE and has met with HAL and staff to be told THEY DO NOT WANT ABSOLUTE TRANSPARENCY BECAUSE IT IS THEIR SECRET SAUCE like I have, I'd suggest my statements carry more weight....as far as my 1-24 hundred win teams go...I attribute that to awful luck...BUT wouldn't be shocked if it was something else.

as far as my 1-24 hundred win teams go...I attribute that to awful luck...BUT wouldn't be shocked if it was something else.
even I would have to admit that seems more than just bad luck

Long ago - and my memory on this is pretty fuzzy - but it seems there was a back to back league where everyone had to commit to playing the same exact teams both seasons. As I recall there was a huge difference in the standings - a testimony to the random nature of the game. Anyone recall this?

Dinsdale,
thank you, that clarifies the issues in this post--because that is why when certain patterns keep repeating, it raises red flags.

As an aside, I’m trying to understand this one:

ATG 9 All Eras 104 teams 9,056-7,792 .538 49 playoffs 39-24 .619 46 Champs

If I’m reading this correctly, that’s 46-3 winning rings when they make the playoffs. This isn’t in the kiddie pool of Baseball Daily. This is a 47% making the playoffs rate in ATG9, and winning rings 46 of 49 times they are in the playoffs.

104 teams isn’t quite newb territory. I’m a little curious…

That's insane

I have been saying for a while that I believe certain teams are (for whatever reason) "DESTINED" to succeed or fail.

You get in a league and see what you believe to be a "bad" team perform way over their head and it just makes NO SENSE.

And I too, like Nev and many others tired of 100 win teams getting swept in the Semis by 88 win teams that you had beaten like a rug all season long. I posted about the 100 win curse more than once and my record with 100 win teams is pretty abismal.

The data from multiple owners on "home run normalization" was extensive and went way beyond one league, just as many of the other "modifiers" being discussed here are not isolated examples, they are based on recurring patterns that owners have notated.
The fact that STRAT has acknowledged that "modifiers" have been used, and Bernie has told some of us that modifiers were being used, certainly does not give us confidence that some of these are not still in place.

Which gets us back to the question of intention...i.e. why would STRAT use modifiers to begin with?
The STRAT community will grow, more new owners will get attracted to the game and buy more teams, if they feel that they have a chance, and if they get to win a championship without having to buy 20 or 30 teams to do it, then that will keep them involved.
So what happens when a new customer joins and buys some teams?
They can get discouraged as they discover their baseball knowledge and even their STRAT board game knowledge, does not necessarily translate successfully to the on-line version of STRAT---i.e. its a very different animal.
So after spending a couple hundred dollars without success, some owners drop out.
So my sense is that STRAT was looking at this, and decided to implement some strategies to keep newer owners interested.
In the earlier days the experienced pro owners figured out how to maximize homeruns, how to maximize extreme ballparks and players, how to use super relievers, how to use 4 stud starters and three .5 mill player bullpen etc.---and the complaints poured in from the neophytes...
If you don't think so, look what STRAT did.... they put in the homerun normalization modifier, they pulled the rug out from under the super-reliever strategy, they increased the bullpen requirement to 4 "relief only" relievers etc. --each of these changes was designed to thwart strategies that the pro owners had developed in order to gain an advantage.
If you don't think so, then consider this---remember when STRAT introduced the "ROOKIE LEAGUES" where only rookie owners could enter?..--that gave new owners a chance to win a championship early on. Of course that got subverted when some of the pro owners figured out by using a different username, they could enter rookie leagues which made for easy pickings to get credits.
And look at one of the thing that pops up on your team home page on the upper right. There is a list of owners that have won their first championship. Great incentive to newbies. As with many businesses, attracting and keeping new customers is vital.
So all these modifiers being discussed here (homerun normalization, playoff drama, streaks, clutch, run differential etc.)--have in common? They are designed to benefit and encourage new customers....

And to those that insist that this is all conspiracy stuff....
consider this example.
Nevdully's record with 100+ win teams in the playoffs is 1-25. That is just a glaring stat.
Now by itself, you could arguable say...well that is an anomaly....
but when it is happening to other owners as well, it is no long a conspiracy theory, it is a patterned reality.
And then of course, there are those that chime in and state that their record with 100+ win teams is 7-2 and so forth, which they then state that that nullifies the idea that there is any kind of modifier.
But what if the modifier is not applied universally? For example, What if it is applied to owners who purchase hundreds and hundreds of teams? (and thereby less at risk for discontinued participation)
And what if you do the research and find out that there is an abnormal percentage of teams with low number of wins that end up winning championships? STRAT has stated that playoffs have been "enhanced" for dramatic purposes....well I guess they weren't kidding....I mean I know several owners that as their teams approach 100 wins, they purposely try to lose games....

Now I don't blame STRAT for trying things to make this a profitable business, as otherwise they wouldn't be in business, but as we do pay for teams, some straight forward transparency would go a long way.
Transparency meaning clarifying which (if any) modifiers are being used, and if so, how do these modifiers specifically function so we get to know what rules we are actually dealing with, and giving full visibility to pitcher clutch and ballpark/doubles/triples info.

I started playing the board version of STRAT in 1965, I have played countless games/series/seasons using the cards, when the on-line game appearing on TSN, I was in right away, and since then, I have played thousands and thousands of games.

I do love this game, and enjoy it immensely. But I am at the point where I am considering ending my participation, as my own data, and data shared with me by other owners, has raised some serious questions as to the validity of results.

Great, great, well thought out and accurate post summarizing the situation.