Financial Reform in OOTP 19.... MUST READ

[wdoupis]

This is going to be long but is very important so everyone needs to read and understand this.

OOTP has always set your budget equal to previous seasons revenue within a million or so. That is how it is determined and that is the tool that owners must use in order to plan for the future. We have been in complete control of our budgets because it is based on fan interest, performance, and of course consistent winning. For some reason OOTP 19 has drastically changed that and there is not really any rhyme or reason for it and it will be a huge negative for the league. When budgets can just fluctuate with no real understanding of it then it is impossible to plan an organization. We already voted to get rid of owners impacting us because we are the owners and this just goes in line with that. So, as I go in depth explaining what I am going to do here please understand I am not changing anything that we have done. I am just adding a shitload of work for me to manually make changes that keep things moving as they always have.

WHAT HAPPENS FOR THIS SEASON

Well over half of the teams in the league had random and severe budget cuts 2 sims ago and it is much less then what previous seasons revenue was and much less than next years projected revenue. It is not the result of a sell-off, decline in season ticket sales, or anything like that at all. It was just completely random. Boston had a 15 million dollar drop in budget and he just won his 5th WS in 7 years to show you how random it is. So what did I do:

If your budget for this season was higher than it should be then I LEFT IT AS IT IS. We have already done the entire offseason and you will not be impacted by the numbers you saw.

If your budget was lowered for no reason and lower than last years revenue it was raised to where it should be.

Now understand, playoff revenue was never factored in to your budget so it is total revenue minus playoff revenue. Also, I just always rounded up. If you made 140,000,001 then your budget is 141,000,000.

WHAT ABOUT NEXT SEASON AND ON

This is the more important part. As of now 14 of 30 teams projected budget for next year is lower than what your revenue is projected to be. 90% of those are projected to be 15 million or more less. This is insane and impossible to plan and makes no sense at all. It will make it impossible to plan and have any consistency whatsoever. So what will I do:

At the end of April I will adjust everyones projected budget to what your projected revenue is at that point. That will give it a month for fan interest to settle and projected ticket sales are. I will then update it to the exact number during rollover. This will give you the ability to plan the future based on actual numbers that you can see. Remember, this is not a change as it has always been this way. Just a change from the numbers you see right now. This will then still give you plenty of time to have the correct dollars for extensions and whatnot so you can plan your teams future.

One final idea I have but this will be put to a vote as it is an actual change but I would like to implement a budget floor of 90,000,000. It is nearly impossible to do anything with less and I think it is a sound number to say regardless of revenue we will not let a budget get below this so that you have a real chance to address your rebuild and have the money to do what is necessary.

Everyone needs to read this and understand it so if you have any questions message me or post here and we will discuss it. Please understand this is not a change, just something OOTP 19 changed and certainly not for the betterment or our league.

[Seeitsaveit13]

So I get my $4 mil back? Nice. Damn owner.

[The_Niddler]

You asked us to post in here with questions or stuff, so here is what I posted in the other thread:

First, I can tell you, there is no need for a team to have 15 Million in scouting and dev each. When I was good and when I was bad, 7.5 M each is the most they need. I have played with it over many seasons and I just don't see a difference. Maybe that is team specific?

Second, I question this as well, kind of on the same page as George. Are the teams that have bad budgets really bad because they are just bad or is it from bad decisions that they made in the past?

I want to be sure we are not using this as a crutch so now bad teams know they can just suck and not worry about finances because they will have at least a 90M budget.

Third, to shel's normal point, did you take our season file, create another league and sim a few seasons and line up financials using our financial sheet you use for rollovers and see what impact this has on the league in say, 10 seasons? 15 seasons? 20 seasons?

Lastly, how do you know that this is completely random? You state because of Boston, but Boston also got rid of a ton of his top guys through a draft.
Maybe his owner doesn't see the need for such a high budget if he thinks the team won't perform as well.
I am guessing here, but it would be worth you (Billy) hopping on the OOTP dev forums and messaging Markus and seeing if he is aware of this or has any insight to why OOTP19 is doing this before we just make a change all Willy Billy!

[The_Niddler]

And you posted above that this is not a change, but it is.
Did every team have at least a $90M floor in the past? If not, then this is a change.

[wdoupis]

Actually the 90 million floor part I specifically said "since this is a change" I will make a poll.

It is a random drop, I pay attention to these numbers religiously. Your budget is always set to previous seasons revenue. 12 or 13 teams have a budget projected to drop by 15-30 million next season with no drop in performance, fan interest, or anything else. I used Boston as an example because he clearly is not dropping in performance.

Working on testing it later today

[The_Niddler]

Actually the 90 million floor part I specifically said "since this is a change" I will make a poll.

It is a random drop, I pay attention to these numbers religiously. Your budget is always set to previous seasons revenue. 12 or 13 teams have a budget projected to drop by 15-30 million next season with no drop in performance, fan interest, or anything else. I used Boston as an example because he clearly is not dropping in performance.

Working on testing it later today

You say it is set to drop next season, but will that adjust based on how they do this season?

So, say, my team, I am not really looking at my financials, but say, right now, you see it set to drop 15 M, will it no matter what or will it actually adjust based on how we do this season?

If it drops no matter what, I would honestly recommend you message your findings and questions and thoughts and ideas to Markus and get his input.
See if he can help you understand it better before we make a change.

[GeorgesGoons]

Second, I question this as well, kind of on the same page as George. Are the teams that have bad budgets really bad because they are just bad or is it from bad decisions that they made in the past?

I can chime in that my bad budgets in the past were due to bad decisions (financially/trades) which gets you in that rabbit hole of not being able to get a decent team on the field.

[wdoupis]

Yes, it is set to drop no matter what. Fan interest, market size, and revenue are all the same and next year budgets getting slashed. This is not just the good teams like Boston and Richmond. Many bad or average teams are projected to lose 15-20 million for no rhyme or reason.

I assume this is common knowledge but you can always know next years budget as the season goes on by looking at this years projected revenue and it actually updates next years projected budget as your revenue changes whether due to fan interest increase or ticket prices adjusted. It has always been like this until now. It is the only way possible to plan any type of future.

We are not changing that, our system will be exactly the same. I just have to do some manual work now to do this

[GeorgesGoons]

Beef projected revenue is $115M, Budget for next year is $102M.

[wdoupis]

Beef projected revenue is $115M, Budget for next year is $102M.

Half the league is in this boat and should not be. In all other previous versions/seasons that would have resulted in your budget being 115 or 116 million

[GeorgesGoons]

Beef projected revenue is $115M, Budget for next year is $102M.

Half the league is in this boat and should not be. In all other previous versions/seasons that would have resulted in your budget being 115 or 116 million

I would say don't do anything until the end of the year when we can see what 19 actually does. Maybe it'll go up throughout the year and match revenue.

[The_Niddler]

Beef projected revenue is $115M, Budget for next year is $102M.

Half the league is in this boat and should not be. In all other previous versions/seasons that would have resulted in your budget being 115 or 116 million

I would say don't do anything until the end of the year when we can see what 19 actually does. Maybe it'll go up throughout the year and match revenue.

Or he can message Markus and find out in a couple days.

[GeorgesGoons]

Beef projected revenue is $115M, Budget for next year is $102M.

Half the league is in this boat and should not be. In all other previous versions/seasons that would have resulted in your budget being 115 or 116 million

I would say don't do anything until the end of the year when we can see what 19 actually does. Maybe it'll go up throughout the year and match revenue.

Or he can message Markus and find out in a couple days.

Or run a couple of seasons to see how it pans out

[wdoupis]

Beef projected revenue is $115M, Budget for next year is $102M.

Half the league is in this boat and should not be. In all other previous versions/seasons that would have resulted in your budget being 115 or 116 million

I would say don't do anything until the end of the year when we can see what 19 actually does. Maybe it'll go up throughout the year and match revenue.

I will test a couple seasons later today but regardless if it changes at the end of the season it is still a big flaw if you are supposed to have 25 million for extensions but all year you only have 5 million so you can't extend your guys and lose them

[Seeitsaveit13]

Actually the 90 million floor part I specifically said "since this is a change" I will make a poll.

It is a random drop, I pay attention to these numbers religiously. Your budget is always set to previous seasons revenue. 12 or 13 teams have a budget projected to drop by 15-30 million next season with no drop in performance, fan interest, or anything else. I used Boston as an example because he clearly is not dropping in performance.

Working on testing it later today

What are the odds that the team that saw a "drop" didn't do shit to achieve their owner goals? I know I lost my $4 mil because I didn't do a damn thing my owner asked me between him setting the goal and the most recent revision period... That's why mine dropped.

I'm happy to keep the $4 mil you're gonna give me back, but I know why I lost it.

[wdoupis]

I do not think owner goals have a single thing to do with it. I do think we need to look in to removing owners goals as well. We are the owners and we set are own goals and if that is impacting it in some way it should be removed

[Seeitsaveit13]

I do not think owner goals have a single thing to do with it. I do think we need to look in to removing owners goals as well. We are the owners and we set are own goals and if that is impacting it in some way it should be removed

I think it has a LOT to do with it.

He gives us a budget in say, november.

He checks back the exact sim you said the money you went missing, and tells me that my budget went down. Because I didn't do shit he asked for.

I've also had a budget go UP in that same time. It happens again a little ways into the season. Do what he wants, get money. Don't, lose money. Do some of it, budget doesn't change.

[wdoupis]

Maybe in your personal experience that is the case but I dive in to financials all the time for the entire league and 99.99% of the time your budget equals your previous seasons revenue and if you do get a bump or drop like that it is not really related to owner goals but fan interest. If you acquire impact extremely popular players over the course of the offseason and before Preseason begins (season tickets go on sale then) then you are projected to sell way more season tickets and you get a nice bump. On the flip side if you sell off and fan interest drops in that time it will take a hit. These are normal and understandable situations.

What I am explaining is nothing like that. I will also say I ignore my owner goals and could not even tell you what mine are and my budget never suffers for it because I keep winning, keep fan interest high, and revenue keeps growing.

[Seeitsaveit13]

Maybe in your personal experience that is the case but I dive in to financials all the time for the entire league and 99.99% of the time your budget equals your previous seasons revenue and if you do get a bump or drop like that it is not really related to owner goals but fan interest. If you acquire impact extremely popular players over the course of the offseason and before Preseason begins (season tickets go on sale then) then you are projected to sell way more season tickets and you get a nice bump. On the flip side if you sell off and fan interest drops in that time it will take a hit. These are normal and understandable situations.

What I am explaining is nothing like that. I will also say I ignore my owner goals and could not even tell you what mine are and my budget never suffers for it because I keep winning, keep fan interest high, and revenue keeps growing.

Then turn them off. There is 0 point to them if that is the case.

[shel311]

Like I've been saying for years now...