The solution to this has long seemed obvious to me -- let me pay for bigger increases.

Allow up to $4MM increase to scouting budgets with no penalty.

If I want to change more than that, let me pay $2MM out of Payroll for each $1MM of increase.

No penalty or limit on decreasing.

This would make HBD more like MLB (and everything else in the real world). A team can fire all of the scouts at the end of the season. Going from $20MM to $0 is possible.

It's not that easy to build up a better scouting or training department in one season. But it is possible, if an MLB throws enough money at it. Making us pay 2 for 1 is probably good enough for a game.

I think it's obvious the 20-someting coding wizards who created HBD didn't have a lot of real-world business experience.

We're not "budgeting" the amount we put in College Scouting, High School Scouting, International Scouting, Advance Scouting, Training, and Medical.

We are "spending" that money to hire staff or whatever at the start of the season. Contract are signed or however you want to think about it.

Player, Prospect, and Coaching Payroll are budgets. We are guessing, based on what we know when we don't know very much, how much we think we'll want to spend.

We should make changes if FAs cost or less than we guessed. Or if a great IFA appears (or does not appear). New information = new ways to spend money. Just like in life and MLB.

It is broken. Every MLB team can drastically change their budget from one year to the next. Teams that have a big change in available payroll due to players contracts expiring due change their budgets drastically at times.

There is not much worse then taking over a team and having to take 2-3 seasons to get the budget where you want.

The point of the restriction is so you can’t make radical shifts in budgets quickly. And I understand that there are cases where this may be possible in real life, but there are cases in HBD where deviating from real life is necessary to protect competitive balance and attempt to attract new owners.

It’s all a balance. It’s the same reason you can’t commit 100% of your payroll 3 or 4 seasons out. Real life teams can do it, but you can’t do it here because you want to protect potential new owners if that one bails.

I've already done this in another thread, now transferring to this one. I may just cut and paste this for the rest of the time I'm here.

From tlowster:

I think at times suggestions get put on this thread not for the overall betterment of the game, but with the intention of removing obstacles in the owners way that prevent him from running his blueprint in the most effective way possible.
I see a lot of great suggestions on here, but i also see some that would just make things easier for the owner to win his way.

There are really 2 different problems going around on these threads. The first is, should an established owner get to move budgets quickly, and I'm against that. But there is also brianp87's concern about new owners having to take garbage budgets.

My question to the "budget conservatives" (none of whom are allowed to have a franchise in WAS for real world emulation purposes)-- what are your concerns about letting incoming new franchise owners set any budget they want (other than aliases, and worlds should just police the hell out of aliases)?

Posted by bripat42 on 1/19/2021 1:17:00 PM (view original):
Quote post by tufft on 1/19/2021 12:47:00 PM:
This would make HBD more like MLB (and everything else in the real world). A team can fire all of the scouts at the end of the season. Going from $20MM to $0 is possible. ...
I think it's obvious the 20-someting coding wizards who created HBD didn't have a lot of real-world business experience.

Well, real-world business experience should tell you that going from maximum to zero immediately is not realistic. In most any business of any significant size or scope, there always will be lingering expenses due to existing contracts, commitments, etc.

I'd have no problem allowing budget reductions of up to $8M per season, but increases should remain at $4M. Building the staff and infrastructure necessary for a top scouting, training, or medical staff takes time, and those increments reflect that.

Overall, I disagree with the use of the word "fix" here. To fix something, it should be broken, and I just don't think this element of the game is broken. Let it be.

+1

Posted by dedelman on 1/19/2021 4:50:00 PM (view original):
There are really 2 different problems going around on these threads. The first is, should an established owner get to move budgets quickly, and I'm against that. But there is also brianp87's concern about new owners having to take garbage budgets.

My question to the "budget conservatives" (none of whom are allowed to have a franchise in WAS for real world emulation purposes)-- what are your concerns about letting incoming new franchise owners set any budget they want (other than aliases, and worlds should just police the hell out of aliases)?

This second piece got me thinking. Excellent counter to the real life comparison discussion.

What concerns would I have personally if incoming new franchises could immediately set their most desired budget?

The first concern would be cherry picking veteran owners. I am already not a fan of the owner that takes over another man's winning franchise, loads it up with talent via free agency and trades, wins a few championships, then at the first sign of trouble, he ditches the team. Allowing incoming new franchisees full freedom with their budget will likely lead to the same cherry picking veteran owners finding Worlds where there is a significant difference between college/HS/intl and upon entry, they immediately place 20 million in whichever scouting department the World has the least allocated to and clean up multiple prospects in the first few seasons. It is an easy way to build a juggernaut and look like a genius.

My second concern is more of a hypothetical than an inevitable -- the concern that a new owner takes a while to learn the game and before he understands that advanced scouting is worthless, he is in his third season and instead of starting the third season with 18 million and he has wasted 30 million the last two seasons, he is starting his third season with 20 million and he has wasted 40 million the last two seasons.

Posted by dedelman on 1/19/2021 4:50:00 PM (view original):
There are really 2 different problems going around on these threads. The first is, should an established owner get to move budgets quickly, and I'm against that. But there is also brianp87's concern about new owners having to take garbage budgets.

My question to the "budget conservatives" (none of whom are allowed to have a franchise in WAS for real world emulation purposes)-- what are your concerns about letting incoming new franchise owners set any budget they want (other than aliases, and worlds should just police the hell out of aliases)?

I would argue that a new owner that is experienced can and should be treated like an established owner. An experienced owner knows when to punt on draft, and can typically still make good picks with 14 budget and the possibility always exists that the outgoing owner while not great, might have had a budget that lines up to a 16+ scouting budget. I suppose that the outgoing owner might have junked the draft to focus on IFA, in which case he could have left useful IFA pieces, will the new owner forfeit those pieces? It seems like this scenario would lead to way to much double dipping to fix a problem that I don't think is that bad to begin with. Yes, joining a new league can be daunting, but the reward for building correctly is that you don't have to deal with that in the future once you have your budget where you want. It would be wrong to penalize existing owners for doing things the right way.

I see both points and they are both valid.

Posted by tlowster on 1/19/2021 11:42:00 PM (view original):

Posted by dedelman on 1/19/2021 4:50:00 PM (view original):
There are really 2 different problems going around on these threads. The first is, should an established owner get to move budgets quickly, and I'm against that. But there is also brianp87's concern about new owners having to take garbage budgets.

My question to the "budget conservatives" (none of whom are allowed to have a franchise in WAS for real world emulation purposes)-- what are your concerns about letting incoming new franchise owners set any budget they want (other than aliases, and worlds should just police the hell out of aliases)?

This second piece got me thinking. Excellent counter to the real life comparison discussion.

What concerns would I have personally if incoming new franchises could immediately set their most desired budget?

The first concern would be cherry picking veteran owners. I am already not a fan of the owner that takes over another man's winning franchise, loads it up with talent via free agency and trades, wins a few championships, then at the first sign of trouble, he ditches the team. Allowing incoming new franchisees full freedom with their budget will likely lead to the same cherry picking veteran owners finding Worlds where there is a significant difference between college/HS/intl and upon entry, they immediately place 20 million in whichever scouting department the World has the least allocated to and clean up multiple prospects in the first few seasons. It is an easy way to build a juggernaut and look like a genius.

My second concern is more of a hypothetical than an inevitable -- the concern that a new owner takes a while to learn the game and before he understands that advanced scouting is worthless, he is in his third season and instead of starting the third season with 18 million and he has wasted 30 million the last two seasons, he is starting his third season with 20 million and he has wasted 40 million the last two seasons.

These actually are pretty good points that I hadn't thought of.

I don't think incoming new owners should be able to start with any budget they want. Currently, they have the option of starting with 10's across the board, or start with the previous owner's numbers. This is better than it used to be, where they had to start with 10's across the board no matter what. The other possible option would be to start with the league average numbers.

also, when you're truly a "new" owner - your very first team - you have more budget flexibility...it isn't all just 10s. Trouble is, you don't best know how to allocate the budget that first time...don't know your team, the league, or the game well enough.

Would people like it more if you had the option of starting with "All 10s" each season? You'd have more flexibility while also not being able to do long-term damage to the franchise (as much).

Or, something like every 5 seasons you start with a blank slate? Kinda like a new regime coming in.

Posted by Scotb50 on 1/20/2021 4:09:00 PM (view original):
also, when you're truly a "new" owner - your very first team - you have more budget flexibility...it isn't all just 10s. Trouble is, you don't best know how to allocate the budget that first time...don't know your team, the league, or the game well enough.

Would people like it more if you had the option of starting with "All 10s" each season? You'd have more flexibility while also not being able to do long-term damage to the franchise (as much).

Or, something like every 5 seasons you start with a blank slate? Kinda like a new regime coming in.

See I do not think this is true either. As a new owner I knew what to do pretty much from day one. I read the forum and looked at good teams in other worlds. Its not really a cut and dry situation.

10's across the board is terrible. That will get you nothing in the draft. Can't improve your roster with all the false information from being stuck in the middle. Should be able to set whatever you want.