Anyone want to share their first impressions?

[harry lime]

The thing about playing an individual season is you will never have the choices that you have in ATG-- ATG has tons of choices--it's a flaw and a selling point.

These are the players the real teams had to deal with-- and there were twice as many teams. I think in a way this is much more challenging. You can't just plug in Frank White or Crosetti if you lose out on the stud MI's.

I think, the downside is--it will be relatively easy to "figure" this game out. Probably only one or 2 different strategies will work. My guess is that this game doesn't have much staying power. The autodraft could be a huge factor here.

[richswerb]

What Harry Lime said ...

[RiggoDrill]

I think [b:61c1677210]Harry Lime[/b:61c1677210] makes some good points, but not sure I'm in total agreement. Since the total player pool is fewer than 700 cards (I think), there are defintely some limitations. However, I think there's going to be more than 2 strategies, so I think the game will have some staying power (if not the total volume of 200X or ATG2). Personnally, I see quite a few different ideas I'm looking forward to experimenting with...

:P

[RiggoDrill]

I also like the collection of [b:2f12487bcd]Ballparks[/b:2f12487bcd]. Lots of variety! 8)

[tomwistar]

I have no experience with '05, but coming at this from an ATG perspective: I like the fact that a good field/no hit ss or a catcher who can hit .270 or a 3b with 15 hr, 80 rbi potential actually becomes significant. A bunch of interesting platoons are possible. For people who don't mind low-scoring games and unflashy stats, I think it could be a really interesting challenge.

But since I don't have time to really study the cards, I'm sure I'm going to suck!

[Houndog]

Fielding at SS and 2b sorely lacking. Catchers for the most part have poor arms, (a couple of exceptions). Alot of gba's on the hitters cards. Alot of negative clutch on the hitters cards. May need to use platoons more in this game. Since these are only impressions from briefly looking at the cards I may be mistaken.

Looks like you have some guys who can steal (if they can get on base). Very different than ATG II. Will have to try a team to test a few theories.

[harry lime]

Here's what I really like-- you really get a sense of the value of certain guys. Where in ATG, they are just lost.

Take a guy like Dick Green or Davey Johnson. In this set you see how truly valuable they were. No one uses these guys in ATG. Look at the Balt. team--almost every position they have one of the top guys in the league.

Don't get me wrong-- I love ATG, but I think it distorts reality.

[PJ Axelsson]

I've got extreme teams on offense and pitching and defense starting tonight, should be fun to see what happens.

[DOUGGRAY]

[quote:b24e2077b6]Fielding at SS and 2b sorely lacking[/quote:b24e2077b6]

I really never understood this point of view. Compared to what?? An allstar set with the best players from all time? ATG2 is the fantasy game and is the farthest of them all from reality.

Also, If everyone is a 2 or worse then how are they lacking? it is really all relative and actually more realistic since I dont remember a team in real life with all GREAT defensive players. No one here even will see the X-charts and no one is going to be at a disadvantage so really what is lacking?

The only thing I see is that the ATG crowd has been spoiled with having 8 players with 1s on D for way too long and maybe we should get back to reality here ;) Are people so fixed on the 1 that they dont realize no one else will have a 1 either on D?

[egvrich]

[quote:952308776e="the splinter"]Has there ever been a card with higher OBP vs. LHP the Francona?[/quote:952308776e]

I'll let you know since I just kicked off a season with him last night.

Tom Hutton is also "real interesting" versus LHP's.