Really giving up with batting?!!

[Gamer Pradosh]

How do you just nudge the ball around your legs?

Watching west indies at south africa on willow right now and South Africa are playing all sorts of little crafty knocks and nudges and pushes for 1's.

Press defensive trigger halfway and play the shot its that nudge you are looking for...In my opinion its hard to do for me because when I try doing this I tend to press it fully instead of half when playing the shot...

 

[bl8000]

Yeah I agree, sorting out the pressure point is difficult at times.

I will give that a go in practice mode. Thanks.

They were a bit like leg glances but they craftily played them in any directions using the bat deftly to redirect the balls bowling speed into open areas

I might try a formula of RT plus LAS 6 with RAS 7/8/5/4

 

[The_Pharoah]

The batting controls in DB14 are great and very intuitive. The only issue is that its extremely difficult to properly implement! Take for instance...the nudge (ie. block with force in a specific direction). Thats a combination of LS = Up (front foot), RS = Up/Right (nudge to cover), RT = pull half way. Thats three actions you have to coordinate, which isn't so bad.

Now, you add in the time it takes from first recognising what ball is being bowled (assume Fast bowler), to making the decision that I should block the ball....to then implementing the above at exactly the right time.

As a RL batsman, you do this without thinking too much because your brain does it for you (left leg forward, bat up..but not too much, angle to cover, etc). Trying to replicate this on an xbox controller on the other hand....

The above is just a comment (I'm at work on a Sat afternoon...its raining cats n dogs from the hurricanes up north and I'm bored) - I think its great, but it takes a LOT of practice and the key is choosing when to play it. Trying to play this to a bouncer (through premeditation) runs the risk of nicking behind.

 

[Nack]

Since this seems to have become 'the batting thread' I figured I'd post this here... Has anyone ever hit a reverse sweep for four? I only just started playing them because I found they are a good low risk way to get runs off balls that are pitched on or around a good length outside off rather than trying to drive and nicking off. However I never seem to get a lot of power out of them? Maybe I'm just not timing them sweetly enough?

 

[balkeet]

nope, sweeps n reverse sweeps don't go for boundaries in game

 

[Nack]

nope, sweeps n reverse sweeps don't go for boundaries in game

Ah, I see. That's a shame, you often see them go for four IRL. Heck, Maxwell hits reverse sweeps for six sometimes.

 

[cooks1st100]

nope, sweeps n reverse sweeps don't go for boundaries in game

Hmm I've seen sweeps go for boundaries while bowling, not often though.

 

[bl8000]

Exactly! Like many sports games, fifa I am looking right at you!

The cpu can do things the user cant, or if the user can it requires so many precise inputs on the controller its darn near impossible to pull off.

Fifa cpu can do slow speed cruyff turns regardless of player skill. User has no definitive input to do them.

Batting in this game is similar.

Has anyone seen the cpu do this batting? A spinner bowling for you, the cpu takes a mighty swipe and misses but then quickly swings the bat back and knocks it for 4. Well done cpu, but why cant I? If I miss I am trapped in an animation that has to play out before another input registers.

Another thing, was watching Bravo bat last night until his injury. He always steps across with his front foot, then adjusts open if the ball is in on his legs or steps back in front if its more in line with his bat or stays that way if its off stump.

As far as I can tell, you get 1 chance at footwork in this game. You certainly get 1 chance based on the speed of the bowler batter interaction. Just a shame Bravo can do an orchestrated footwork dance IRL and yeah...

 

[bl8000]

Just in case this happened to anyone else.

You use the big ant squad in practice. The starting batter for me was difficult to use with constant late and mistimed shots. When I would get a single the other batsman was always way better.

I went and checked the big ant squad. The starting batter for me in training is R Symons. On my squad he had all of his batting ratings at zero. I moved them all to 50% and went back into training. Much better footwork and timing reports.

My zeroed out Symons may have just been a glitch or something when obtaining best squads at the start. But just in case anyone else is struggling with timing in training, go have a look at your Symons.

 

[bl8000]

How do you just nudge the ball around your legs?

Watching west indies at south africa on willow right now and South Africa are playing all sorts of little crafty knocks and nudges and pushes for 1's.

I will answer my own question.

Sorry, you can't. These delicate shots are not in the animation "pool" in the game currently.

No matter the button combination you press or the pressure on the triggers you cannot simply move the bat across your stationary legs to play clever nicks to fine leg. Nor can you turn the bowl around you to third or slips.

These shots are not in the game.

The shots that are in the game all involve way too much swinging, lifting and manipulating of the bat which prevents the deflection shot from being played.

When I hold the defensive RT trigger I only block on a radius from mid wicket to cover. No matter what I do, even if pre bowl I move as far across off stump as I can, I cannot deflect the ball through to either leg.

Oh well, DBC 16 maybe.

If someone knows how to play a 10-20m leg glance or running the ball down to third, I am all ears...eyes, rather.

 

[bl8000]

This is how it should work.

LT is loft
LT + RT is ground
RT is blocks
LB is unorthodox

So LB + RT could be assigned for glances, knocks and deflections. Not that these shots are unorthodox. Its just that there needs to be some way to let the game know you want to be surgical with the bat.

 

[The_Pharoah]

nope, sweeps n reverse sweeps don't go for boundaries in game

nah mate, it does. it doesn't happen very often however I've swept balls to the boundary for both standard and reverse sweeps. I think it happens only when you hit it sweetly ie. perfect timing. Don't forget, the 'slow down ball before boundary' thing that BA put into the game does impact this as well.

the main thing is timing.

 

[Nack]

This is how it should work.

LT is loft
LT + RT is ground
RT is blocks
LB is unorthodox

So LB + RT could be assigned for glances, knocks and deflections. Not that these shots are unorthodox. Its just that there needs to be some way to let the game know you want to be surgical with the bat.

Hey man, you got me thinking about this. I really should be sleeping but instead I decided I have to post about it now...

I think the best way to set up the controls would be like this:

Not pressing any triggers means that you play a straight bat shot, no matter what direction you aim and no matter what length the ball is. So...

As is the case now, aiming straight will produce drives, hitting to the covers will produce cover drives but... aiming to midwicket or behind square on the leg side will produce the nudges to the leg side that we are currently missing and aiming behind square on the off side will produce the straight bat push down to third man.

Similarly to how it is set up now, holding L2 while playing any of these shots will mean basically the same shot is played but with more power. So the drives will be lofted in the air over the in field, as is the case now, but the midwicket shots will be the leg glance/around the corner shots (depending on length) that we currently have when not pressing a trigger, and aiming behind square on the offside will produce the square drive which is also absent currently. Notice that all of these shots are basically the same shots IRL but with more of a flourish of the bat.

OK, so what about the horizontal bat shots? Well...

Holding R1 will mean that you play a horizontal bat shot no matter what direction you aim and no matter what length the ball is.

This would allow for another important feature which is missing from the batting at the moment: the ability to hit horizontal bat shots down the ground. This next part will probably be taxing to animate but I think it'd be nice if you could also play horizontal bat shots no matter what the length of the ball is. So if the delivery is short then shots to midwicket will be the pulls which are produced now, and same with cuts, but you will also be able to play slightly different pulls, cuts and horizontal bat shots down the ground to fuller balls (all of which could go for four along the ground, if timed well enough) and a really full ball outside off which you aim to play to the offside will produce that sort of 'drop the bat on the ball' shot that you see sometimes. Shots aimed behind square will be late cuts or, if the delivery is short enough, the ramp shot. For spinners, all of this will be basically the same except that the pulls will be sweep shots.

As with the straight bat shots, all of the horizontal shots can also be played with more power by holding L2. So the 'flat bat' shots down the ground will be lofted and could go for six (McCullum style), the pulls will go in the air (as is currently the case) but aiming behind square on the leg side will mean they are also hooked, square cuts and late cuts will go in the air (as is currently the case), and the ramp will become an uppercut. For the spinners, the sweep will become the slog sweep which we are currently missing: holding R1 and L2 and aiming anywhere from square on the leg side all the way to mid off would be a slog sweep in that direction.

I think the other features of the batting which we have now should remain pretty much the same, that is, most of the shots have both a front foot and back foot version, R2 is a straight bat defensive shot and L1 is a special unorthodox shot. So to do a reverse sweep with my system you would get on the front foot, hold R1 to indicate you want to play a horizontal shot and hold L1 so that it will be a reverse sweep rather than a cut shot. This could also be used for the paddle sweep by aiming behind square. To play the 'slog reverse sweep' you would hold R1, L1, L2, and aim to the off side and to play a scoop shot to a fast bowler you would hold R1, L1, L2 and aim behind the wicket. Oh and I think holding just L1 while aiming down the ground should produce an advancing drive along the ground, holding L1 and L2 should produce an advancing lofted drive, and holding R1, L1, L2 should produce an advancing lofted horizontal bat shot down the ground (again, McCullum style). So basically anything played down the ground while holding L1 is an advancing shot.

I'm not sure how complicated this will sound to others (for me it seems really intuitive) but I'd like to hear others' thoughts. Also I'm aware that this will require a lot more animations than we currently have and would take a lot of work but if this system was used for the next iteration I think it would result in a stunning simulation of batting (not that I don't already think Big Ant have done an amazing job with the first iteration.)

 

[bl8000]

Very nice post, I love insightful thinking about this game because I firmly believe this to be the thinking man's videogame.

Big ant is on to the right thing here but the more I play it the more I think they got bowling sorted and batting was done next and they ran out of time. Bowling seems to have almost unlimited freedom while batting seems to be saddled with canned animations we summon with stick positions and button presses.

In my opinion that is what makes batting so difficult in this game.

The next thing is how it works, you press those buttons and hold sticks and then the game decides what happens based on where the ball is. Enough time spent in the nets shows me there is a miss animation and a connect animation for each position on the right stick. Which means you hit when the game thinks you should hit and you miss when the game thinks you should miss.

This is the exact reason why you see the hiccup animations where it warps your batter from one side of the crease to the other just to play out a whiff animation.

Where I think they got it right is this system could work but for it to work right we need at least double the swing animations. This could easily be done for DBC 16.

If they could affford a mo cap session they could have a bowler face a batsman and record a vast array of swings.

Now back to the current set of batting animations, earlier on when I was trying to sort out batting in this game I would look at replays closely. Between that analysis and the posts people have made here I begun to realize you have way less control batting than bowling.

For example, a nice drive for 6 to cover looks exactly like the same animation for popping out short to cover. I would look at where the ball met the bat and wonder why the pop up happened because both shots were off the sweet spot.

So, bottom line, for them to continue on with this batting system isnt a bad idea so long as they add more batting animations.

If we do the math we see there are 8 right stick positions. 6 left stick. That should be 48 different swings.

Its not. Its more like 16. A front pool of 8 swings and a back pool of 8 swings.

Holding the loft or ground shot modifier uses the same 16 but adds or subtracts loft.

Defensive button brings in roughly 3 more animations. Off on and leg blocks.

What puzzled me in the beginning was there are stick combinations which summon up nothing but a whiff animation if your front/back foot is wrong.

This is when an edge should be more likely to happen or the mistake shot which turns into a single or you get bowled. Instead its this unsightly miss animation the cpu never does when they bat.

Nowhere to end with this post as I could discuss batting and bowling in this game for hours. I love it to be honest, I just see so many possibilities for it to even closer resemble the sport.

 

[grkrama]

timing, ball spin / seing /l;ength etc also play a part in how shots go to six or to fielder