Why projections are not enough
A lineup optimizer maximizes average points. Tournaments do not pay the average: they pay the top of the field, so what matters is how often a lineup finishes near the top and how many other people have the same players.
A simulator answers that directly. Instead of one projection per player, it uses a range of outcomes, plays the slate out, ranks every lineup in the contest and pays out the prizes. Do that thousands of times and you get each lineup's expected return.
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1
Player outcomes
Every player gets a range of scores, correlated with teammates and opponents.
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2
The field
Thousands of opponent lineups built to match projected ownership.
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3
The contest
Each sim ranks the field and pays the real payout ladder, entry fee and rake included.
Every player gets a range of outcomes
DraftDime's floor and ceiling projections set how wide a player's range is, read as the 20th and 80th percentile of his outcomes. Each sim draws a score for every player from that range.
Draws are correlated the way real games are: teammates rise and fall together, a shootout lifts both sides, and a goalie or a defense suffers when the other team scores. The correlations are calibrated on past results for each sport.
Building the contest field
Your lineups do not play in a vacuum. The simulator builds a field of opponent lineups, from 10 up to 200,000 entries, that matches projected ownership: if a player is projected at 30% owned, about 30% of the field has him.
You can make the field casual, typical or sharp, and set how much salary it leaves on the table. The field also stacks the way real players do in that sport, so duplicate lineups show up naturally, as they do in real contests.
Setting the contest
Pick a payout preset (top-heavy, balanced or flat GPP, single entry, double-up, 50/50 and more), enter a custom ladder, or read one from screenshots of the contest. Set the number of entries, the entry fee and the rake, and how full the contest is likely to be.
Then add the lineups you are entering, from an optimizer build or a CSV upload, to see exactly how they do against the field.
Reading the results
Each run sims the slate up to 50,000 times (20,000 by default). Every lineup, yours and the field's, is ranked by what it actually returned across those sims:
- ROI: average profit per entry after the entry fee
- Cash: share of sims it finishes in the money
- Top 1% and Win: how often it finishes at the very top
- Dupes: how many field lineups are identical (and would split the prize)
- Average ownership, projection, average sim score and average finish
Using the results
Filter by player, stack, dupes, cash rate or projection, favorite the lineups you like and save them as a build. From there they go into your CSV and contest entries like any optimizer build.
Once games start, late swap in the simulator tries several swap options for each of your lineups, sims every one against the field and keeps the best by ROI. Save the result as a new build and apply it to your entries.
Try the DFS simulator
Open the simulator, pick a slate and set up a contest. Running sims is part of the DraftDime Gold plans.
FAQ
A tool that plays out a slate many times with each player's range of outcomes, builds a field of opponents, pays the contest each time and reports every lineup's expected ROI.
DraftDime runs 20,000 by default and up to 50,000. More sims make the ROI of rare outcomes, like winning a large GPP, more stable.
From projected ownership: the simulator builds opponent lineups until each player appears in about his projected share of the field, with the stacking habits and salary usage of real contests.
NFL, NBA, MLB and PGA contests on DraftKings and FanDuel.