Post by Derek _ Red Sox on Feb 17, 2015 23:02:53 GMT -5
Hey guys, how's everything?
I wanted to get your feedback on the GCL but first I wanted to fill you in on the past GCL experiments so you have a frame of reference.
OOTP is not as largely invested in online leagues as I would like them to be. Part of it, (well most of it) is their customer base is largely offline players. Which to this day, shocks me.
So when I came to them with this idea, I wanted to showcase not only the great online leagues out there - but the comradery, the human-human competition, and the creative side of online leagues that to me offline lacks.
First 2 Years
With that said, the first two seasons I had 24+ teams and we did a full inaugural draft. To me, quite honestly that is the best way to determine the best team but at the same time in a 1 and done format, that may be tough to swallow because teams who draft later in the draft are usually preparing for years down the road as opposed to a 1 and done - and also getting 24+ people to pick, make draft lists etc all in a timely fashion can be quite frustrating.
The other thing we noticed was - by the time say June came around, the teams that were terrible just vanished on us. Which to me, impacts the competitive balance because playing against teams that aren't setting lineups etc doesn't prove much.
So with so much time invested on the draft - people quite honestly became so frustrated with the league in spite of my efforts that it simply was not fun for them, and wasn't fun for me.
New Format
Inaugural drafts suck, plain and simple. Even with StatsLab, you can be at a crawl and in a 1 and done league it's hard for me as kind of an "honorary" commish to be tough on guys I don't know when they are unprepared for a draft. And trust me, it happened a lot.
So I went to OOTP with a similar format to the one we have now. I figured, let's cut out the biggest problem and let everybody build their own roster. In hindsight, I should have dropped the salary cap which probably would have created more diversity amongst selected teams.
The major difference was I wanted to do 4 leagues/4 era's.
So basically we'd do everything the same in the 1980's, crown a champ league and then that rep would sit out in the 1990's and their league could select a new rep. (If their league wins again it's fine)
So basically we'd run thru 4 "seasons" and crown 4 "decade champs" and then we'd basically have a 4 team championship to crown the ultimate GCL Champ.
Timing was the major obstacle here.
So we landed on what you see now. I wanted to incorporate images, league promotions (Previews I posted) and just as much as I could in a 1 and done format to promote your online league as well as online leagues as a whole.
Thoughts?
I want to know your thoughts on how it's going so far, are you enjoying the league? Are you interested in your nightly results? Is there a way we could have done this better?
Give me the good, bad and ugly.
None of your feedback to me will be listed by name to OOTP.
I wanted to get your feedback on the GCL but first I wanted to fill you in on the past GCL experiments so you have a frame of reference.
OOTP is not as largely invested in online leagues as I would like them to be. Part of it, (well most of it) is their customer base is largely offline players. Which to this day, shocks me.
So when I came to them with this idea, I wanted to showcase not only the great online leagues out there - but the comradery, the human-human competition, and the creative side of online leagues that to me offline lacks.
First 2 Years
With that said, the first two seasons I had 24+ teams and we did a full inaugural draft. To me, quite honestly that is the best way to determine the best team but at the same time in a 1 and done format, that may be tough to swallow because teams who draft later in the draft are usually preparing for years down the road as opposed to a 1 and done - and also getting 24+ people to pick, make draft lists etc all in a timely fashion can be quite frustrating.
The other thing we noticed was - by the time say June came around, the teams that were terrible just vanished on us. Which to me, impacts the competitive balance because playing against teams that aren't setting lineups etc doesn't prove much.
So with so much time invested on the draft - people quite honestly became so frustrated with the league in spite of my efforts that it simply was not fun for them, and wasn't fun for me.
New Format
Inaugural drafts suck, plain and simple. Even with StatsLab, you can be at a crawl and in a 1 and done league it's hard for me as kind of an "honorary" commish to be tough on guys I don't know when they are unprepared for a draft. And trust me, it happened a lot.
So I went to OOTP with a similar format to the one we have now. I figured, let's cut out the biggest problem and let everybody build their own roster. In hindsight, I should have dropped the salary cap which probably would have created more diversity amongst selected teams.
The major difference was I wanted to do 4 leagues/4 era's.
So basically we'd do everything the same in the 1980's, crown a champ league and then that rep would sit out in the 1990's and their league could select a new rep. (If their league wins again it's fine)
So basically we'd run thru 4 "seasons" and crown 4 "decade champs" and then we'd basically have a 4 team championship to crown the ultimate GCL Champ.
Timing was the major obstacle here.
So we landed on what you see now. I wanted to incorporate images, league promotions (Previews I posted) and just as much as I could in a 1 and done format to promote your online league as well as online leagues as a whole.
Thoughts?
I want to know your thoughts on how it's going so far, are you enjoying the league? Are you interested in your nightly results? Is there a way we could have done this better?
Give me the good, bad and ugly.
None of your feedback to me will be listed by name to OOTP.