losing fighters to inferior offers

[ksbass]

Ok. I used to think losing everybody to ALPHA-1 was legit, but it has gotten a bit silly. I seem to be regularly losing fighters that I matched base pay and offered much better performance and win bonus on. My offers also have more guaranteed matches. Both companies (I have SIGMA) are now Low International (June 2001).

Are the things we can't see (merchandise, medical, etc.) factored into the better offer message and do they matter more than the basics??? Is it hte prestige of fighting in Japan?

This is happening on a regular basis at this point, and not just to me. It appears that ALPHA-1 now owns every good fighter in the Cornellverse (they have bought ALL of GAMMA's starting champs), and they are NOT paying them more that others offered.

[Lt. Lucrativo]

Yeah, this has been happening to me as well. It's a bit annoying to hear that ALPHA-1 has offered a better contract at the negotiation screen and then find out that, at least as far as is visible, the contract that they've succeeded with is actually much worse than my final offer.

I'm pretty certain it doesn't have to do with them making better offers with regard to medical expenses and the other factors that aren't visible when looking at the contract status of fighters employed by AI promotions. A while ago (and a few patches ago--so maybe things are different now?), I offered Fezzik the best contract possible with GAMMA--every category maxed out--and he turned it down to accept a "better offer" from ALPHA-1 which gave him much worse performance and win bonuses. The length and number of matches and guaranteed matches offered were equal. At the time I assumed that maybe he just wanted to stay in Japan with the organization he was used to (although I'm pretty sure that GAMMA was much larger than ALPHA-1 by that point) and that it might be worth turning down potential millions of dollars to him. But now that I'm losing my own fighters to inferior offers, that doesn't seem to be the case.

[Adam Ryland]

I seem to be regularly losing fighters that I matched base pay and offered much better performance and win bonus on. My offers also have more guaranteed matches.

That would be your problem - you need to beat the AI's offer, not match it. The base pay is the most important factor in negotiations, if you are in a bidding war you must beat what the AI is giving. The other factors have minimal effect (on the war, they must still be good enough to satisfy the fighter).

[Decado]

That would be your problem - you need to beat the AI's offer, not match it. The base pay is the most important factor in negotiations, if you are in a bidding war you must beat what the AI is giving. The other factors have minimal effect (on the war, they must still be good enough to satisfy the fighter).

That doesn't really make sense to me... If the base pay is equal, and everything else is better, then surely the fighter would choose that offer?

It might only be a small impact, but what reason could the fighter have for leaving under those circumstances? How can we alter/control them?

Does that mean if the AI is willing to bid the top base pay we can NEVER keep/steal fighters?

If so that seems like a fairly major flaw to me...

[Adam Ryland]

That doesn't really make sense to me... If the base pay is equal, and everything else is better, then surely the fighter would choose that offer?

It might only be a small impact, but what reason could the fighter have for leaving under those circumstances? How can we alter/control them?

Does that mean if the AI is willing to bid the top base pay we can NEVER keep/steal fighters?

If so that seems like a fairly major flaw to me...

1 - The base pay is the key element of any negotiation. "If the base pay is equal" is an irrelevant statement, if you are in a bidding war your first task is to put the best base pay offer in. The rest is of secondary concern.

2 - No, you are completely mistaken about "NEVER" being able to keep \ steal fighters, there is never an unwinnable situation.

[Decado]

That would be your problem - you need to beat the AI's offer, not match it. The base pay is the most important factor in negotiations, if you are in a bidding war you must beat what the AI is giving. The other factors have minimal effect (on the war, they must still be good enough to satisfy the fighter).

1 - The base pay is the key element of any negotiation. "If the base pay is equal" is an irrelevant statement, if you are in a bidding war your first task is to put the best base pay offer in. The rest is of secondary concern.

2 - No, you are completely mistaken about "NEVER" being able to keep \ steal fighters, there is never an unwinnable situation.

In response to 1)

Why is it other orgs can steal our fighters by offering equal pay, but we can't steal theres by doing the same?

It doesn't seem fair (or logical) that by offering the same base pay and worse benefits elsewhere the AI can steal our fighters..

Unless i'm missing something important here, Same Base pay + extra elsewhere should = Better deal?

Perhaps the contract engine could be tweaked to take more account of the other settings in the case of the base pay being equal?

[Adam Ryland]

Why is it other orgs can steal our fighters by offering equal pay, but we can't steal theres by doing the same?

That's just the way it is, it's part of the challenge. Even if you have some moral problem with the fact it's biased toward the computer, you should be considerably better at handling finances than the AI anyway, so paying a fairly minor extra amount isn't going to have a great deal of impact on the game irrespective of that.

Perhaps the contract engine could be tweaked to take more account of the other settings in the case of the base pay being equal?

It could be.

[Decado]

I know it seems a bit like creating a mountain out of a molehill here, and i apologise if it comes off like i'm being ungrateful for your work, it's not my intention. I have the utmost respect for what you do.

I would just love to see the game be as good as it could be and have any little things that don't quite work as one would expect to be ironed out. It seems to me that there is a (small admittedly) potential for a big problem with the current set up - that being if the game ever reaches a stage in the finances where other promotions will happily bid the maximum amount for fighters, then players will never be able to steal/keep them. Probably not an urgent priority to be amended of course, but it pays to be aware of it i guess =)

On another note text can be notoriously difficult in conveying intention etc behind them, and i just want to assure you that i'm by no means trying to attack or undermine you, and i apologise if it comes off as such.

[mickel]

There is a certain amount that the AI will never go over, and it relates to how popular their company is. For example, I KNOW, that when I'm in a bidding war and the fighter asks for 50k, if I offer 80k, they pull out. When alpha-1 were at International, I had to offer 90k to make them pull out. When they ask for 140k, offer 200k, they pull out. For the big name fighters, I can, all the time, offer 750k to make ALPHA-1 pull out, when they were international I had to offer 850k (though I proably could get away with less, with big name guys having less patience I haven't done as much testing here).

It's really a fairly simple process to secure any fighter if you really, really want to, it just depends on how much you're willing to pay out.

[Adam Ryland]

It seems to me that there is a (small admittedly) potential for a big problem with the current set up - that being if the game ever reaches a stage in the finances where other promotions will happily bid the maximum amount for fighters, then players will never be able to steal/keep them. Probably not an urgent priority to be amended of course, but it pays to be aware of it i guess =)

Please see point 2 of my second reply; the situation you have described cannot happen.

[Decado]

Please see point 2 of my second reply; the situation you have described cannot happen.

In that case i retract my concerns =P

Admittedly i would still prefer the contract system to be a bit more nuanced, with different fighters looking for different things, and different aspects of the contract being important to them, but that might be a tall order to be done in a patch.

If it's something you might be interested in doing though, I would be happy to come up with some relationships between personality/number of fights/recent form and the importance of the different contract variables. Personally I think a fleshed out negotiation game area could add more tension to the proceedings.

In saying that, by adjusting the finances to be tighter (and forcing people to be more careful about the contracts they offer) There has already been a nice little increase in tension trying to get the best deal without the fighter walking away, so thanks for that ^.^

[ksbass]

Thanks for explaining what is happening, Adam. Not a major problem, just glad to know that I will have to beat base pay to make the financial monster that is ALPHA-1 lay off.
I thought it was the unseen items I was losing on, which would have been more frustrating, actually.
I can deal with the AI being given that edge, for balance and challenge purposes. Just have to decide who is worth it and who is not.

[Adam Ryland]

Admittedly i would still prefer the contract system to be a bit more nuanced, with different fighters looking for different things, and different aspects of the contract being important to them, but that might be a tall order to be done in a patch.

It should not be that difficult, I will look into it when I have some free time.

[Oyaji]

I'm doing a game with GAMMA and finding the reverse happen to me. ALPHA is toiling in mid level national popularity and I'm usually around mid level international in popularity. This being a good year and a half to two years into the game. It seems to me that ALPHA and SIGMA aren't fighting hard enough to keep their top stars. Because stars are the lifeblood of a successful MMA promotion, one would think they would fight tooth and nail to retain guys like Fezzik, Yamamoto, Oktay, and Cabal. It seemed all too easy for me, with roughly $40 millionn+, to pry them away from their original companies. I could certainly understand SIGMA not being able to compete with the bigger offers I put on the table for their stars but ALPHA has the cash to match any of my offers unless I get very ludicrous.

One quick sidequesiton that could be answered here without starting a new thread, what conditions have to be met in order for a successful takeover attempt to go through? I'm having the toughest of times trying to buy out minnows like BCF.

[Tag01]

One quick sidequesiton that could be answered here without starting a new thread, what conditions have to be met in order for a successful takeover attempt to go through? I'm having the toughest of times trying to buy out minnows like BCF.


I've yet to figure that out either. It's not money; at least not by itself. You can edit any company to have huge losses and they won't sell.

[Nephrinn]

I'm doing a game with GAMMA and finding the reverse happen to me. ALPHA is toiling in mid level national popularity and I'm usually around mid level international in popularity. This being a good year and a half to two years into the game. It seems to me that ALPHA and SIGMA aren't fighting hard enough to keep their top stars. Because stars are the lifeblood of a successful MMA promotion, one would think they would fight tooth and nail to retain guys like Fezzik, Yamamoto, Oktay, and Cabal. It seemed all too easy for me, with roughly $40 millionn+, to pry them away from their original companies. I could certainly understand SIGMA not being able to compete with the bigger offers I put on the table for their stars but ALPHA has the cash to match any of my offers unless I get very ludicrous.


Same here. I find the negotiations process extremely (too?) easy. The key to stealing fighters is always offering 3-5 increases in base pay right from the start. I think that companies, especially the bigger ones, should be much more aggressive in keeping their top tiered, most popular fighters.

One quick sidequesiton that could be answered here without starting a new thread, what conditions have to be met in order for a successful takeover attempt to go through? I'm having the toughest of times trying to buy out minnows like BCF.

You have to wait until you get the "company xxx is going bankrupt" news item and offer then. After paying the company's debts, you can take it over. I've picked up three companies doing this.

Although, I had one company still go out of business despite being taken over by me. I got several news items stating that its parent company (me) was getting angry at their debt and was thinking about dropping them. Is this suppose to happen or is it a bug? It just seems like I should have the option of deciding whether or not I want to take the debt or not.