PointGuard wrote:This thread topic is a good idea, Rizzo.

I've run a bunch of careers while the game was in beta testing. But I didn't keep records on outcomes. In general I can say I was pretty unsuccessful when starting a player on the junior tour...most ran out of money in a year or two. I did get one or two golfers to advance to the pro tour...and one of those wasn't successful enough the year he was on the pro tour and reverted to the junior tour.

I had more success with those golfers I started on the pro tour. A few did pretty well although I didn't run their careers for too many years. But I had some failures there too.

I have a feeling I'm going to find out the same thing the hard way in my career because I'm not even close to making the cut with money dwindling. If you start by playing on the PGA Tour, do you start with more money to put towards your attributes as well as cash on hand? Or is that based on the difficulty setting you select?

I've tried most all levels from very easy to hard.

Does the difficulty change how the game is sim/played out or is it just effecting the starting funds and attributes you can begin with?

I tried a lot of different options regarding how I allotted the talent levels. Typically though I set my golfers up with strong putting, consistency, woods, and wedge ratings. Zorro has some strong preferences which I believe he laid out in other threads.

I'll have to hunt down Zorro's thoughts. I think the problem with my build is it is too evenly distributed and I don't have any ratings that stand out and I can lean on. I think that's going to come back to bite me.

Typically I started with average clubs and balls and also didn't go for the highest cost caddie.

I've set training from $500 to $5000 at the beginning. It sort of depends on how much cash I have on hand at the beginning with a golfer I've set up. I tend to use the XP stars that can increase my golfer's skills soon after getting them. But if they are of a value that don't work with my talent levels I turn them in for cash.

How successful did you find your training sessions when they were set to those levels? I'm at $5,000 and I only earned two stars - one was a platinum after the first training which I think is gifted to any new golfer created - so it's cost me a lot of money for not much return. I think I'll have to do what you did and cash them in either for an upgrade in a skill I want to focus on or just cash.

I've tried both 1-click and 3-click methods. Generally I prefer 3-click. I've gotten to the point where my golfer can shoot a pretty good round when I play out the round whether I use 1-click or 3-click.

I've run some of the golfers using all sim and others where I played out the tournaments.

Do you find it equally realistic if you sim or play the tournaments? I understand wanting to sim it and letting the ratings play out but I've heard/seen some things that said starting in on the lower tour it's nearly impossible to succeed when you just sim the tournaments.