Warrior General Games

Originally posted by Xars
Common misconception about process, but not result.

The Tactics Matrix is very, very good. I'd like a wrinkle added here and there, but the Matrix is very powerful.

The problem is the Playbook. There aren't enough options given the power of the Tactics Matrix. I know there's 400+ plays, but that's not the point. It's the mix of plays and how they are categorized.



To be honest I think the playbook is fine as well. The only situation I really find myself struggling in as a DC is when I have a short blitz and short non-blitz in two different formations and want to call the blitzes at different times. Otherwise if at least one of the four plays is a medium or long play it becomes very easy to manage.

I still dont get why we cant set our own 4th down tactics. Who cares if someone wants to be stupid and go for it on 4th and short on their own 20? Even as a run only team those 4th and shorts are never fully guaranteed. We should absolutely be able to set our own tactics for the situation, I find it stupid that the sim will punt on 4th and inches on my opponents 37 for the 17 yards of field position rather than go for it. It would allow more strategy, and especially since this is a simulation based game, why do we not have control over this? Why do we instead have to rely on the seemingly random 4th down attempts the sim does on its own?

Originally posted by FairForever
To be honest I think the playbook is fine as well. The only situation I really find myself struggling in as a DC is when I have a short blitz and short non-blitz in two different formations and want to call the blitzes at different times. Otherwise if at least one of the four plays is a medium or long play it becomes very easy to manage.

The plays are fine; the tags are not. There needs to be multiple distance tags for each play.

Get rid of Superstars

Originally posted by TxSteve
Which team do you DC for?

I do the tactics (O and D) for the Odessa Eagles. Of course, I can imagine someone critiquing my performance (somewhere along the line I think I posted an acknowledgement I'm nothing special at this point), but it's irrelevant to discussing how the sim should work in any event. I gave what team just so people wouldn't claim I don't really do it at all or something.

ya - I don't want to pick on you - but I would say your choice to keep defensive playbooks more broad is a choice that is far from ideal in the current sim. same road many of the rest of us have been down.

Originally posted by Xars
The plays are fine; the tags are not. There needs to be multiple distance tags for each play.

Agreed in theory - but it will be extremely confusing for new DCs to understand why a certain play is in the playbook 2 - 3 times. I think the current system allows for a lot of flexibility already (as mentioned, the main issue I have is when I want to run short blitz and short non-blitz at different times in different formations).

I prefer the original option to tag plays as desired - but understand that that is a huge coding overhaul.

Fix blitzing corners, they should actually blitz on counter plays.

More offensive plays in Singleback Big, Diamond, and Singleback Spread
More defensive plays in all formations, add a wide double lurk to 4-3 as well as a lurk/robber combo (ideal to stop TE's). Add LB zone's shifted towards one weak side and strong side.

I'd love for shifted double lurk's to be added to the Nickel playbook, such as these two:
http://imgur.com/plLNxhg
http://imgur.com/SZLvOHb

They'd help balance between pass coverage and defending the run. Since balanced teams out of the 3WR set are becoming particularly dangerous, it's really hard to defend all aspects of it.

Originally posted by Nyria
The thing is, you want (and I agree, though my means of doing it would be a little different) to allow defenses to react to unexpected offensive play spam. And again, I very much agree with that.

But offenses should also be able to react to even unexpected defensive play spam. I think a defensive play should be able to be run more often than an offensive play before that kicks in, but play spam on either side of the ball should be heavily penalized.

And in fact, for balance it's kind of necessary-- because against ZEB spam, there are a limited number of plays that work well against ZEB, though those tend to work very well. So even if you anticipate ZEB spam, when doing offense you go heavy on those plays. But because some will get overused, there's a penalty. That overuse should generate a penalty, but only if the ZEB spammer also gets a penalty for spamming ZEB.

Here's a thought. Do my suggestion for the defense, and yours for the offense. That way, you can't get into a repeating loop like that.

Offense is spamming, defense calls better plays to shut it down.
Defense is spamming, offense gets skill buffs to beat it.
Both spamming, the defense is calling better plays and the offense is getting more skilled as the game progresses.

Originally posted by AirMcMVP
I can wish for $10M to fall into my lap today but its NGTH. If I was delusional enough to believe it would happen, I would hope someone would set me straight so I could adjust my expectations.

So you're saying that the $10m is on your wish list, despite it NGTH. And then a bunch of bs.

Glad I could help you figure it out.

Originally posted by Cuivienen
Here's a thought. Do my suggestion for the defense, and yours for the offense. That way, you can't get into a repeating loop like that.

Offense is spamming, defense calls better plays to shut it down.
Defense is spamming, offense gets skill buffs to beat it.
Both spamming, the defense is calling better plays and the offense is getting more skilled as the game progresses.

I can't wait to see all the complaints when defensive PBs get changed mid-game into something that is "supposedly" better at stopping the offensive spam but ends up hurting the defense more (either in actuality or just perception).

Originally posted by FairForever
I can't wait to see all the complaints when defensive PBs get changed mid-game into something that is "supposedly" better at stopping the offensive spam but ends up hurting the defense more (either in actuality or just perception).

Yeah, like I said, it would need a toggle for the DC to choose if he wants to use the feature or not.

And obviously the skill buffs would need to be balanced so that in the double spam situation, neither side is guaranteed to lose (i.e., buffs are too weak to keep up with perfect play calling or buffs are too strong for any play to stop the O).

Originally posted by Xars
Common misconception about process, but not result.

The Tactics Matrix is very, very good. I'd like a wrinkle added here and there, but the Matrix is very powerful.

The problem is the Playbook. There aren't enough options given the power of the Tactics Matrix. I know there's 400+ plays, but that's not the point. It's the mix of plays and how they are categorized.

Agreed. Ever since they made the inside/outside change, it's solid.

The playbooks need to be expanded even further. The more plays added, the more people will have an easier time fitting what they want into the tactics.

The number of relevant plays can be dropped by at least half. If your a Man defense, you will rarely if ever use Zone, and vice versa. Most teams simply don't have the roster to effectively run a 5-2 for all but a few specific situations. A team also may not be built to only rush 3. Well there goes 3-2 Dime and Quarter, so that drops the playbook from 50% (man vs zone) to 30% of the total amount.

Once you start accounting for how defenses are built, the total number of available plays drops surprisingly.

More offensive and defensive plays would do a lot of good things. For two seasons in a row they added a bunch of Double Lurk plays, that was great. We need more play infusion like that.

Originally posted by Mysterio
I still dont get why we cant set our own 4th down tactics. Who cares if someone wants to be stupid and go for it on 4th and short on their own 20? Even as a run only team those 4th and shorts are never fully guaranteed. We should absolutely be able to set our own tactics for the situation, I find it stupid that the sim will punt on 4th and inches on my opponents 37 for the 17 yards of field position rather than go for it. It would allow more strategy, and especially since this is a simulation based game, why do we not have control over this? Why do we instead have to rely on the seemingly random 4th down attempts the sim does on its own?

In seasons past? You play the Stunners and never, not once stop them on a drive unless you cause a turnover or they do something incredibly stupid.

Even at this point I would say it is near impossible to stop an all run team 4 straight downs enough to win a game.

Let's not even get to the point of a balanced team trying to stop that 4 straight downs. May as well just call it a day unless you are a wizard. Just isn't enough ways to accurately make stops on short distances without completely opening yourself up for a million different things. You give any of the top coords that for 2-3 straight downs and you will get 90% of people stop caring if they did in the first place.

Originally posted by bhall43
In seasons past? You play the Stunners and never, not once stop them on a drive unless you cause a turnover or they do something incredibly stupid.

Even at this point I would say it is near impossible to stop an all run team 4 straight downs enough to win a game.

Let's not even get to the point of a balanced team trying to stop that 4 straight downs. May as well just call it a day unless you are a wizard. Just isn't enough ways to accurately make stops on short distances without completely opening yourself up for a million different things. You give any of the top coords that for 2-3 straight downs and you will get 90% of people stop caring if they did in the first place.

Agree. Can't have 4th down tactics without significantly changing the game. It disproportionately affects running teams. I would legitimately just run Off Tackle in all situations except 4th and long, even on No Name.