The
Historical Settings page is accessed from the
Create New Game page when you are setting up a new game, and it can also be accessed later by navigating to
OOTP Menu >> Game Setup >> League Setup >> Historical. This page is only available when a historical league is selected, and is used to modify a variety of options related to historical simming. It is divided into the following sections:
Note: The above links will not work from within the in-game browser. However, they all simply link to sections lower in this page, so just scroll down to find the appropriate section.
Historical Progressing Options
Historical Progressing Options control how your league behaves between seasons.
| Option | Description |
| Automatically expand league | Automatically expands your historical league at the precise time that real-world leagues expanded. OOTP will automatically handle changes in team names, nicknames, league structure, etc. |
| Expansion Mode | Defines whether or not an expansion draft will be held if you have chosen automatic expansion. |
| Protected Players per Team | Defines how many players are protected in the expansion draft. |
| Base Roles / Positions on | Defines whether historical progression will be based on the real-life statistics of a player or the AI's assessment of his skills. For example, real-life statistics would cause Dennis Eckersley to become a relief pitcher at the same time he did in real life, while AI evaluation could cause him to remain a starter. |
| Automatically adjust League Strategy | Automatically changes leaguewide strategies according to the historical era. This includes things such as the frequency of stolen bases, etc. See the Team Strategy Page for more information on the different strategies this can affect. |
| Import adjusted financial settings after each year | Realigns your league finances with actual historical numbers after each season using a set of historical financial data stored in OOTP Baseballdatadatabase inancials.txt. |
| Prevent recalculation of potential ratings | Disable recalculations of player potential ratings in historical leagues, resulting in improved AI for career leagues using ratings recalculation. Each time players get imported, their talents will get locked to the "Base Potential Ratings on..." option you chose upon initial import (career totals, remaining years, etc.) (This option only available in version 11.2.0 and greater.) |
| Retire players according to history | Forces players to retire from OOTP after the same season in which they retired in real life. Otherwise, OOTP will decide retirement by itself, and historical players may end up having significantly longer or shorter careers than they did in real life. |
| Players miss seasons according to history | Forces players to miss seasons in OOTP when they did in real life, for example due to military service. |
Historical Rookies Options
The
Historical Rookies Options affects the treatment of rookies in historical leagues.
| Option | Description |
| Automatically Import Historical Rookies | If this box is checked, each year the actual rookies from the historical database will be imported into your league automatically. If you want historical rookies to be assigned to the same teams they played for in real life, you must disable the first-year player draft in the Amateur Draft Rules section of the Rules page. Rookies will be imported on the first day of the preseason. If this box is unchecked, all historical rookies will be dumped into the first-year player draft pool. |
| Database Path | During game creation, this area displays the text 'Please set after game has been created!' When you access this page through Game Setup later, the database path will be set to the directory that stores your historical database. If you have moved your historical database, or if you didn't use a historical database during game creation, you can enter a new path here. Warning! If the historical database is moved or deleted without correcting this value, your game will be unable to continue! |
Note: If you are importing historical players, you might want to schedule your first-year player draft between October and November. Otherwise, your rookies might make their major league debuts a year earlier than you expected!
Player Ratings
The historical
Player Ratings control how the OOTP engine rates historical players.
| Option | Description |
| Recalc player ratings based on real stats after each year | Forces OOTP to recalculate player ratings (both actual and potential) after each season based on how the players performed in real life. For example, if in the next season in real life a player performed at a much higher level, his OOTP ratings will increase automatically. If this is enabled it overrides the potential ratings calculation method chosen in the Advanced Options of the Historical Game Creation Wizard. If this is not enabled, players will improve normally according to their OOTP potential ratings. |
| Double weight of current year stats | Doubles the weight of the player's current year stats evaluating historical players. If you are playing in 3-yr recalc mode in 1988, for example, then player ratings will be based on 1987+1988+1989 stats. If you are playing in 3-yr recalc mode with "double-weight" in 1988, then player ratings will be based on 1987+1988+1988+1989 stats. The focus year is added twice into the evaluation. Some people feel that this option results in more realistic AI decisions in certain areas, like pitcher roles. |
| Base Ratings on | Defines whether you will base player ratings on their actual stats (using the Lahman database), or park-neutralized stats (Garlon/Spritze database). |
| Base Rookie Fielding Ratings on | Defines whether to base rookie fielding ratings on the current season, a 3-year span, or their entire career. |
| Base Pitching Stamina on | Defines whether to base pitching stamina on the current season, a 3-year span, or their entire career. |
Statistical Accuracy
The
Statistical Accuracy section defines whether or not OOTP should automatically adjust league totals modifiers for historical accuracy. If checked, OOTP automatically adjusts league totals after each season, based on the actual league totals in the upcoming year. This will result in your historical league producing league totals very similar to actual historical totals from that year.