Posted by hypnotoad on 1/23/2018 2:57:00 PM (view original):
I think what they meant is that they don't treat it like a literal dice roll modifier (adding +1 if you hit it to LF for example), but they use it to represent the relative differences between the parks. So a +4 rating in Santa Fe makes it a lot more homer friendly than a 0 in Rochester, but nowhere in the programming is '4' added to anything.
No, this is wrong ^
For home runs specifically, positive park factor "enhances power" and it does so literally in the hitter's power attribute. In WIS, POW is calibrated to [home runs per hit], where 0 units of power is literally calibrated to 0% HR/Hit and the top of the scale of 99 power is calibrated to approximately 28% HR/hit. This is based on the historical average up until 2005 or whenever WIS was created.
So when the game does the pitcher-batter interaction, having +4 HR means that a hitter with 99 power aka 28% HR/hit will hit a HR at a higher rate than he would in another stadium. So in a sense it creates the illusion that the batter has power of 103 because his HR/hit is skewed in that direction. Same principle for -4 stadiums but in the other direction
Let's consider one of the asymmetrical stadiums- Minute Maid Park.The given dimensions are "315 362 435 373 326" and the real life data supports the authenticity of WIS's given PF as 0 0 2 2 1. They play indoors on turf or whatever with slightly above average foul territory, so this creates a standard volume of singles and doubles. However, because of the stupid mound in dead-center, everything that would normally go for a double (or a 400-435 HR) goes for a triple, thus the +2 increase for their weird asymmetry
Also, let's also consider Minute Maid's directionality for a moment. Left field is short and has the train above the restaurant, center field has the grassy knoll, and right field is slightly shorter compared to other stadiums but not as short as LF--- 315 at the LF pole is super short and 362 in the alley is very generous, so real life data supports that more HR are hit to LF than RF in this stadium. What this means for HBD is that for every at-bat:
whether an out, or when a batter gets a hit based on splits (.280 or whatever), the game uses whatever his power is calibrated to (let's say 99 = .280 again) to determine HR or XBH or single, and then determines push/pull to determine the directionality of every out/hit. So if our sample .280 x 280 batter is RH with low push/pull, he ends up having a slightly higher HR/hit and HR volume than a LH batter with the same .280 x .280 combination at this specific park. The difference ends up being very small, like 29% or 29.5% HR/hit vs the "normal" 28%
You won't notice the affect in a visiting series or even a single home season, but over hundreds and thousands of games you will begin to observe the slight boost. It is actually built in, even though the devs gave a very poor explanation in the past
1/23/2018 4:49 PM (edited)