Baseball Card Installation Guide

Annually Updating Cards

OOTP has the ability to update the card templates used each season as your league progresses.

Gambo has created a combined file for league history to date: Baseball Card Templates Combined File

This file is also available as part of the All-In-One mod, which can be downloaded in game. For instructions on adding it manually, read the section on adding an individual template below.

Year-By-Year Updates

Each card template can be modified with a year indicator to tell OOTP to use that card template from that point forward.

e.g. all_star_1939.xml would indicate to start using this card in 1939 for All-Star cards going forward.

For more information, see Matt Arnold's forum post here: BB Cards By Year

When we search for a bb_card to use, say for the hall of fame, our default file is hof.xml, found in the bb_card directory. However, if you have the following files in your directory:
hof.xml
hof_1995.xml
hof_1980-1990.xml
hof_1985.xml

Then instead of using the base value always, in 1985 we will use the 1985 file, in 1995 we will use the 1995 file, and for every other year in 1980-1990 (inclusive), we will use the 1980-1990 file.

Note that anything after the year designation, is ignored when the game is selecting files, so you can include additional detail there like the manufacturer name and the cards will still work as described above (see Naming Files).

Adding an Individual Template

There are two types of files that make up baseball card templates:

• XML Templates - These contain data about the layout of the card and what text/statistics to display
• Images - These are the graphic elements needed to make up the card. Player photos and team or league logos will be rendered by OOTP on card creation.

OOTP Baseball Card templates are stored in the game's data\bb_cards\templates folder.

 C:\Program Files\Out of the Park Developments\OOTP Baseball <version_number>\data\bb_cards\templates

If you installed in a different location, or just want an easy way to jump directly to this folder, open up OOTP and click on the Settings option. A pop-up window will display. Choose the Troubleshooting tab, and click on "Open folder containing customizable data". From there, open the bb_cards folder and you should see the templates folder.

Within this folder are two subfolders: ootp<version> and ootp<version>_mac. The first is for Windows and Linux based installations, the second for Apple OS. Whatever operating system you're running, you can safely ignore the other folder.

Within the ootpXX subfolder, you'll find the default card template XML files that come with the game, as well as an images folder containing the graphic elements needed for the default cards. All you have to do is make sure that the package you download gets the XML and image files into the right folder. Depending on how the modder packaged up the files, you can either unzip directly into the ootpXX folder or you'll have to move them manually after extracting the package contents.

If you want the new cards to be used automatically, you'll have to make sure the file names match the default file names. Don't forget to save off the OOTP default card templates if you ever hope to restore them without reinstalling. If you want them called only on demand, you'll need to make sure the file names do not match the default file names. Or, if you want them to update annually as your league progresses, you can rename them according to the information above on year-by-year card updating.