You've got questions about Dynasty?

How is Dynasty different from fantasy baseball keeper leagues? or how is it similar?

It's similar in that you root for your players to do well, but you don't have the same sit/start decision about real MLB games. You're rooting for their entire season to go well so you have a more useful player the following season. During the year, you're managing your team through simulations so the real MLB games don't impact your daily managing.

I don't get it, where does the skill come in?

In the day-to-day, set good lineups and good strategies to fit your team and you can exceed your talent and win more games.
At times, you will have to play worse players and how you mitigate that can mean the difference between a win and a loss.

In the year-to-year, you can recognize good talent by watching real MLB games or scouring sabermetrics stats. If you have an eye for players about to break out, you can build an impressive roster. If you always pick up prospects that never work out, you may find your roster gets old and starts to have issues producing.

So players will put up exactly the same stats as they did the previous year?

No. Games are simulated based off of ratings I generated using their previous year. During simulations, anything can happen, and the "luck stats" can be totally different. You may have a MLB player that hit .250 but had an unlucky .270 BABIP. In the simulations, he may have a lucky .340 BABIP and end up with much better stats. Also they're competing against slightly better competition. (Players from 30 MLB teams put onto 20 teams so the bad players get weeded out)

What about players that play in extreme hitter's parks or extreme pitcher's parks?

This is sort of a strange distinction, but BABIP will play as though it's a neutral park and it's defense-dependent. Since you're playing a different defense, the results will be different. Home run rates will hold, however. So if a guy hit a Coors-assisted 20% HR/FB rate, he'll still have that 20% HR/FB rate in the neutral park the games will simulate in.

In general, hitters will get a bump in value when they get signed by Colorado, so it pays to notice things like that.

Why 20 teams not 30?

You can only use hitters for as many PA (plate appearances) and pitchers for as many BF (batters faced) as they had the previous MLB season. With 30 teams, it would be too difficult to have enough players to get through a full schedule.

What players do I start with?

There will be a draft to start the league with a randomly generated snake draft order. If you join a league in progress, you just get that team as-is, which can be a fun puzzle to solve. We almost always need GMs to do this!

How much time will this take?

Games are run at a real-life pace, meaning once a day from April to October. You can set a lineup and rotation and not check your team for a few weeks. Putting time into scouting before the draft and trying to work trades with other GMs could reap benefits. You do have to manage usage limits and will need to make some lineup and rotation changes periodically because of that.

How good is this simulator?

I've worked hard on it, and it's really good in terms of BB%/K%/BABIP/Defense. Baserunning and strategies are probably the roughest areas.

Is this free?

As of now, yes. I appreciate early adopters. I plan to charge for leagues eventually.

You've got questions about Franchise Mode?

How does scouting work?

The draft has some public information like you would see on public rankings sites, but like real life, that info isn't gospel. You can assign area scouts and special scouts to scout amateurs, minor leaguers, and major leaguers to get more opinions. That information isn't perfect either, and won't necessarily match the information that scouts from other teams gives. Your job as GM is to sort through that and make a decision for your team.

How does the draft and international players work?

You draft only 4 rounds but 20 rounds are generated using adjusted rankings and your scouting. International signings are more random, generated based on July 2 strategies that that you set each year.

How does player development work?

Injuries, body type, and good/bad performance contribute to realistic player development curves over time. Some ratings peak early, some later. It's a little random, so you could see down years which don't necessarily mean a decline is happening. Prospects are not guaranteed to reach their potential scouted ratings, they often don't. This can be frustrating to GMs building a franchise, but I felt that was realistic. Your coaches and scouts will advise on prospect handling. Your job as GM is to sort through the stats and scouting and make decisions for your team.

Do I lose players to Free Agency?

Yes, sometimes. It can be frustrating to GMs building a franchise, but I felt that was most realistic. You have to interact with the AI Agents. There may be league options in the future.

How do finances work? Are there small-market teams?

I chose not to have a great market disparity between teams, so this is a not-real segment of the game. Market differences are constrained to only a 20% gap. Beyond that, franchise performance can affect the budget an additional 30%. The design is that you are the GM working with an owner that provides you a budget. As in real life, owners can make exceptions to allow the GM to make certain moves.

Other stuff?

How do you interact with the other GMs?

Through email or chat programs on social media.

What else are you working on?

So many things!

• Mostly making these leagues better and sustainable
• Free single-game head-to-head play between two users with MLB roster or arbitrary constructed rosters. This technology will eventually be used within every league to allow teams to play their games live and manage during the game.
• Other sports like basketball, football, hockey, soccer ... This would be years away

Why Google Accounts?

Honestly, it was easy for me to set up. I will probably do OpenID down the road, but my focus needs to be on the game simulation right now.