Changes Since ATG 4

Hey Everybody,

I managed one team in ATG 8, but for the most part, haven't played since the old days of ATG 1-4. I recognize a few names from back then, pretty cool! I did notice Petrosian is in my league, but no Nevdully's.

What are some of the biggest differences I should keep in mind? Is HAL better with the bullpen? My league starts tonight, do people still post links to their teams for suggestions?

Thanks everybody!

Is HAL better with the bullpen?

BWAAHAHAHAHA!!!

ATG9 is robust enough to allow many different winning strategies, as long as you
- Pick four 9* starters and set them to F0
- Fill out the rest of your staff with sub $1M 9L and 9R relievers
- Platoon everybody

One sarcastic response...

I guess stratomatic is just like every other corner of the internet these days, oh well.

It's harder to find values even though the pool is larger.

Pricing and usage limits have changed the bullpen usage, whether for the better or worse is subject to debate.

I only played 5 teams in ATG 8 (and sucked)...have played All ATG 9 and I love it. I can't be much help on changes, sorry. But welcome back!!

Welcome back. The new ATG9 they upped the price of relievers significantly, and they made all the bargains much more pricey....

It's going to be hard for people who have never played ATG9 ( 4000+ CARDS) to go up against people who have played that set hundreds of times and know all the good bargains...

Personally I prefer the smaller single season sets like 1969, 1982, 1986, 1999, 2007- 2020, and the 60s , 70s, 80s, 90s and 2000s mystery sets. Also they will be adding SINGLE SEASON RETRO sets maybe once or twice a year ( hopefully).

You basically have no control over your bullpen with ATG9 ( and some other newer sets) because some guys whined that relief pitchers pitching 200 plus innings is outrageous. But for some reason these same people don't think SPs pitching 360 innings is unrealistic. So because of this you have given up most of your bullpen decisions to the computer....

Best of luck...


ps. In real life MLB baseball a young reliever would have a much better chance of realistically pitching 200 innings in relief than a SP pitching 360 innings...

Also, I don't think the first response to your post was sarcastic, I think that guy was being serious. He's basically telling the truth.

What they really need to do is force everyone to carry at least 26-30 players and also make us carry at least 12-15 pitchers. This would fix a lot of the problems and make usage more realistic.

This is the most important part and where they totally phucked up. You used to be able to set your RP to up to TEN different roles. Now you can only set them to TWO roles. Both are STUPID & UNREALISTIC.

Instead of 10 or 2 , about 4 would have been perfect. Sure wish I knew who made this DISASTROUS DECISION.

Think about it, you can only set a RP to TWO ROLES. But even in REAL LIFE an ace reliever serves in at least 4 or 5 roles during a season, such as CLOSER, TIED and LATE, SETUP, TIED & EXTRA INNINGS, ETC...

So there are at least 20 roles to fill and to fill them all you would need at least TEN RPs. It was an incredibly stupid decision. And they could fix it no problem, but they won't.

Well, you only get two roles for a reliever. So 4 aces strategy at F8 all to F0 is one strategy. I think given the now huge number of cards probably makes platoons a more viable strategy. Also cheap, extremely one-sided relievers are popular. (you can put a bunch of them together for your bullpen). If you have a weaker staff, I think getting two stronger relievers for middle/set-up and set-up/closer and then a decent one at middle/behind and late and a 4th one to cover behind and late. Something like that. You just don't want any .5 guys in your bull-pen that Hal can get at.

Ive used full traditional bullpens at various caps with very good results. So it is possible to win consistently with varied strategies. Like andy said, the values are scarce and most are narrow margins with a few exceptions. Notably many of those values are at lower salaries and lefty killer hitters.

Right on, thanks for the replies folks!

It appears bullpen usage is still quite the hot topic. And yes, this player pool is a bit overwhelming. I may try out some of those other sets.

Cheers!