RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

[Aestis]

So much good work is being done on these forums with slider sets between Charter, Flazko, and all the others who put a lot of time into making franchise play a much more realistic experience. A number of guys in my league use these slider sets when playing their solo CFMs. The last thing this forum needs is another set of realistic sliders for solo/offline franchises.

However, with very little exception these are developed for SOLO/OFFLINE play. Some have house rules, some do not. All good stuff. But I've found that some of these sliders don't apply as well to USER games for 32-man leagues. Not because of cheese or abuse, but rather because how a CPU plays based on different slider levels & their play-calling is completely different from how a competitive mid-to-high level user game will go.


My sliders are entirely optimized for USER v USER online sim league play.

Dating back to M15 I've been tracking our league's User v User stats against the NFL using per-play success metrics (e.g. Pts per play, Yds per rush attempt, Yds per pass attempt, Sacks & INTs per 100 dropbacks/attempts, and many more). This means league-wide hard statistics are what dictate slider adjustments, NOT the personal feel of how the commissioner's team is doing. If I'm personally having a super hard time running the ball but the league as a whole is doing fine...the run game goes untouched. Without this visibility into league-wide stats in USER games only, there is no honest & objective way to balance a 32-man league.


Goal/Philosophy:

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The goal is similar to the goal of other sets: increasing the feel of realism in these games, allowing not only the final scores to mirror the NFL but also the per-play success. In other words, you could have 5 min quarters and wind up with a realistic NFL score, but the gameplay would be wildly offensive (no pun intended). Instead we see a lot of punts, we see lockdown defenses, we see shootouts, we see INTs for teams who like to go deep. M17 is built to achieve this end even better, I believe.

One last key note: in a USER league, there is no one perfect slider set. Each league has a different skill level. Users get better at the game over time, which can skew things more toward offense or defense. As you get further into the file, draft classes vs regressing veterans can throw the talent balance off, causing line play or CB/WR interactions in-game to skew more toward the offense or defense.

Thus our sliders are a moving target, and as such I will update sliders with adjustments as we get deeper into season 3/5/etc. to account for the changing landscape of a typical online CFM league as users improve at the game and drafted players replace aging stars.





Slider set performance vs NFL:
Data through: S3 Wk 1

GAME & SCORING

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RUSHING

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PASSING

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TURNOVERS

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KICKING

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RFF's M17 League USER v USER Sliders

SEASON 1 SET:

Spoiler

Last update: Nov 1
(adjusted for recent tuner update which nerfed the run game)

Game Options
Difficulty: All Madden
Speed: Normal
Quarter Length: 12 min
Runoff: 18 sec
Target Goal: 115-120 snaps/gm, ~1:10 realtime length
Injury: 42
Fatigue: 57
SPD Disparity: 60

User Sliders
QB Acc: 31
Pass Blk: 53
WR Catch: 50
Run Blk: 63
Fumble: 78

Pass D React: 55
INT: 33
Pass Cov: 65
Tackle: 46

FG Power: 45
FG Acc: 100
Punt Power: 55
Punt Acc: 49
Kickoff Power: 51

Penalties
Offsides: 60
False Start: 60
Off Holding: 69
Def Holding: 85
Facemask: 51
Def Pass Int: 75
Off Pass Int: 50
Illegal Blk: 50
Roughing: 50

SEASON 3 SET:

Spoiler

Last update: Dec 19
(adjusted for two classes worth of drafted players replacing aging/regressing starters)

Game Options
Difficulty: All Madden
Speed: Normal
Quarter Length: 12 min
Runoff: 18 sec
Target Goal: 115-120 snaps/gm, ~1:10 realtime length
Injury: 42
Fatigue: 59
SPD Disparity: 60

User Sliders
QB Acc: 23
Pass Blk: 54
WR Catch: 52
Run Blk: 64
Fumble: 80

Pass D React: 53
INT: 33
Pass Cov: 75
Tackle: 46

FG Power: 45
FG Acc: 100
Punt Power: 55
Punt Acc: 49
Kickoff Power: 51

Penalties
Offsides: 60
False Start: 60
Off Holding: 69
Def Holding: 85
Facemask: 51
Def Pass Int: 75
Off Pass Int: 50
Illegal Blk: 50
Roughing: 50

SEASON 5 SET:

Spoiler

Last update: Feb 24
(adjusted for 4 classes worth of drafted players replacing aging/regressing starters + increased user skill after months of practice)

Game Options
Difficulty: All Madden
Speed: Normal
Quarter Length: 12 min
Runoff: 18 sec
Target Goal: 115-120 snaps/gm, ~1:10 realtime length
Injury: 40 (35 while advancing/simming)
Fatigue: 60
SPD Disparity: 70

User Sliders
QB Acc: 25
Pass Blk: 65
WR Catch: 54
Run Blk: 69
Fumble: 79

Pass D React: 49
INT: 33
Pass Cov: 75
Tackle: 49

FG Power: 45
FG Acc: 100
Punt Power: 55
Punt Acc: 49
Kickoff Power: 51

Penalties
Offsides: 60
False Start: 60
Off Holding: 69
Def Holding: 85
Facemask: 51
Def Pass Int: 75
Off Pass Int: 50
Illegal Blk: 49
Roughing: 50

SEASON 7 SET:
Last update: May 9
(adjusted for 6 classes worth of drafted players replacing aging/regressing starters + increased user skill after months of practice)

Game Options
Difficulty: All Madden
Speed: Normal
Quarter Length: 12 min
Runoff: 18 sec
Target Goal: 115-120 snaps/gm, ~1:10 realtime length
Injury: 40 (35 while advancing/simming)
Fatigue: 60
SPD Disparity: 80

User Sliders
QB Acc: 31
Pass Blk: 85
WR Catch: 56
Run Blk: 67
Fumble: 79

Pass D React: 47
INT: 33
Pass Cov: 65
Tackle: 50

FG Power: 45
FG Acc: 100
Punt Power: 55
Punt Acc: 49
Kickoff Power: 51

Penalties
Offsides: 60
False Start: 60
Off Holding: 69
Def Holding: 85
Facemask: 51
Def Pass Int: 75
Off Pass Int: 50
Illegal Blk: 49
Roughing: 50


XP Sliders
QB: 90
HB: 100
FB: 110
WR: 120
TE: 100
OT: 180
OG: 180
C: 180
DT: 100
DE: 100
OLB: 90
MLB: 90
CB: 120
FS: 120
SS: 120
K: 100
P: 100

[mkeller25]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

So much good work is being done on these forums with slider sets between Charter, Armor & Swords, and the few others who put a lot of time into making franchise play a much more realistic experience. A number of guys in my league use these slider sets when playing their solo CFMs. The last thing this forum needs is another set of realistic sliders for solo/offline franchises.

However, with very little exception these are developed for SOLO/OFFLINE play. Some have house rules, some do not. All good stuff. But I've found that some of these sliders don't apply as well to USER games for 32-man leagues. Not because of cheese or abuse, but rather because how a CPU plays based on different slider levels & their play-calling is completely different from how a competitive mid-to-high level user game will go.

Key elements:

1. My sliders are entirely optimized for USER v USER online sim league play.

Spoiler

I spent M15 & M16 tracking our league's User v User stats against the NFL using per-play success metrics (e.g. Pts per Play, Yds per Rushing Attempt, Yds per Passing Attempt, Yds per Completion, Sack & INT rate, etc.). This means league-wide hard statistics were what dictated our slider adjustments. I will be doing the same for our league in M17.

Example:

In other words:

2. My adjustments over the course of M17 will not be driven by feel or changing opinions but rather by hard statistics: how our league's stats are tracking vs the NFL.

Spoiler

The goal is similar to the goal of other sets: increasing the feel of realism in these games, allowing not only the final scores to mirror the NFL but also the per-play success. In other words, you could have 5 min quarters and wind up with a realistic NFL score, but the gameplay would be wildly offensive (no pun intended). Instead we see a lot of punts, we see lockdown defenses, we see shootouts, we see INTs for teams who like to go deep. M17 is built to achieve this end even better, I believe.

One last key note: in a USER league, there is no one perfect slider set. Each league has a different skill level. Users get better at the game over time, which can skew things more toward offense or defense. As you get further into the file, draft classes vs regressing veterans can throw the talent balance off, causing line play or CB/WR interactions in-game to skew more toward the offense or defense.

Thus our sliders are a moving target, and as such:

3. I will post separate slider sets for Season 1, Season 3, 5, etc. to account for the changing landscape of a typical online CFM league.




Season 1
ver 0.9
Updated Sep 1
Note: we will be kicking off the regular season around ~Sep 12, so you can expect these sliders to change slightly over the first several weeks of our season as I get some real User v User data rolling in. I am still testing, so ver 1.0 will be updated just before we kickoff the reg season.


Game Options
Difficulty: All Madden
Speed: Normal
Quarter Length: 12 min
Runoff: 17 sec
Injury: 50
Fatigue: 54
SPD Disparity: 58

User Sliders
QB Acc: 35
Pass Blk: 50
WR Catch: 50
Run Blk: 56
Fumble: 55

Pass D React: 55
INT: 45
Pass Cov: 60
Tackle: 49

FG Power: 49
FG Acc: 55
Punt Power: 50
Punt Acc: 45
Kickoff Power: 50

Penalties
Offsides: 55
False Start: 53
Off Holding: 53
Def Holding: 53
Facemask: 51
Def Pass Int: 57
Off Pass Int: 50
Illegal Blk: 50
Roughing: 50



Primarily still refining for ver 1.0:

• SPD Disparity. Testing with another strong user suggested 60 might be a tiny bit high, but overall it felt much better. Streaking WRs were far less consistently blowing way past good, slightly slower CBs. Additionally, there appeared to be a secondary effect on Man Coverage: DBs were able to stick closer to their man; and Pursuit angles: defenders seemed to take better angles & prevent runners from getting to the sidelines with such ease.
• Run blocking. With SPD Disparity at/near 60 and PDRT at 55, stretch/toss/outside runs were far less imbalanced compared to inside runs, which will make run blocking far easier to balance long-term. At 53 RBK and 60 SPD Disparity vs a good user's play-calling & smarts, running felt way too tough, so am testing bumping up to 56.
• QB Accuracy. Always a work in progress. It "feels" good but I'll know for sure when I see how powerful our league's offenses are after a couple weeks' worth of games.

This should be getting a whole lot more love with the amount of work put in.

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

This should be getting a whole lot more love with the amount of work put in.

Hehe, appreciate it! This is really only applicable to online leagues and even more specifically commissioners of these leagues, so to call this a niche audience is an understatement.

[SyncereBlackout]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Bravo my man. We are getting started next week. I've decided to go default "gameplay" sliders for a season for a more reliable baseline and adjusting from there. I'll keep you posted.

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Bravo my man. We are getting started next week. I've decided to go default "gameplay" sliders for a season for a more reliable baseline and adjusting from there. I'll keep you posted.

Yeah, for our group even on All Madden, default speed parity means the deep vertical is open and a near-guaranteed TD anytime the DB plays at the LOS, whether pressing or not. I cannot envision a scenario where we use 50 SPD disparity online, no matter how it plays in a solo franchise with house rules.

[redsfan4life]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Curious to hear the reasoning for turning fumbles up. I have seen a ton of them in my experience with online user v user. That and I think the run game is OP at default so raising run block is a bit of a head scratcher to me. Then again I play on All-Pro. Will be tracking.

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Curious to hear the reasoning for turning fumbles up. I have seen a ton of them in my experience with online user v user. That and I think the run game is OP at default so raising run block is a bit of a head scratcher to me. Then again I play on All-Pro. Will be tracking.

It's counter-intuitive but the tooltip even says, turn FUM rating up for fewer fumbles. Think of it as a "How good are you at holding onto the ball" slider. Higher = fewer fumbles.

This was a mistake I made in M16 when trying to raise our fumbles to match NFL's fumble rate at the time... raised slider and achieved the opposite, lol.


Run blocking is probably going to be tweaked when a full league's worth of user games start rolling in, but at 60 SPD disparity getting to the edge is much tougher, which makes the run game in general much tougher. At 53 in limited "testing" we could barely run. The good news is for USER v USER games, the run game is one of the easiest things to balance. I measure league average, I compare min/max vs NFL, adjust as per necessary. This is why using league performance is better than relying on one person's experience. Maybe I & my team are awful at running? Based on two cycle's worth of experience, this is doubtful, but who knows. By week 3 we'll be cruising alongside NFL YPC.

[SyncereBlackout]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Yeah, for our group even on All Madden, default speed parity means the deep vertical is open and a near-guaranteed TD anytime the DB plays at the LOS, whether pressing or not. I cannot envision a scenario where we use 50 SPD disparity online, no matter how it plays in a solo franchise with house rules.

Agreed. Stamina, speed disp, and injuries will be the only non default sliders

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Agreed. Stamina, speed disp, and injuries will be the only non default sliders

What SPD disparity are you all running?

Stamina I'm having a hard time with. We generally ran ~55-56 in M16 but I'm finding at that level in M17, the offensive line subs out regularly. Auto-subs can alleviate some of that, obviously, but I dunno how it affects gameplay to have the OL be dark yellow to red stamina the final 1-1.5 quarters.

[SyncereBlackout]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

What SPD disparity are you all running?



Stamina I'm having a hard time with. We generally ran ~55-56 in M16 but I'm finding at that level in M17, the offensive line subs out regularly. Auto-subs can alleviate some of that, obviously, but I dunno how it affects gameplay to have the OL be dark yellow to red stamina the final 1-1.5 quarters.

Speed: 60
Stamina: I like 55, but we will start with 53. Generally, OL play 97-99 of their snaps barring an injury. I had to concede a higher stamina to keep OL realistic and not on the verge of red/grey in Q4.
Injury: 55. It's the bane of my existence. I would like to play on 60-65 for user games but most above 50 completely decimates the CPU teams (average 7 players injured/median 15)

[teampunjabi]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

My brother and I play a franchise together and only play our versus games since we are in the same division. After about 10 games or so with him having Colin kap, rg3, and dak Prescott as his qbs it seems like qb accuracy can be toned down. I do not see as many bad throws from these qbs as I would imagine.

Also granted I don't have great receivers but Davonte Parker and Docson as they have been upgraded have pretty good spectacular catch ratings and it has been roughly a 5% completion rate on deep balls that are one on one. My qb has a decent deep accuracy rating too. Is it possible that the man coverage is a bit high or do you think catching could be increased? What do you suggest.

Also the running game feels a bit hard from my view so far.

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

My brother and I play a franchise together and only play our versus games since we are in the same division. After about 10 games or so with him having Colin kap, rg3, and dak Prescott as his qbs it seems like qb accuracy can be toned down. I do not see as many bad throws from these qbs as I would imagine.

Also granted I don't have great receivers but Davonte Parker and Docson as they have been upgraded have pretty good spectacular catch ratings and it has been roughly a 5% completion rate on deep balls that are one on one. My qb has a decent deep accuracy rating too. Is it possible that the man coverage is a bit high or do you think catching could be increased? What do you suggest.

Also the running game feels a bit hard from my view so far.

Are you playing All Madden or All Pro?

QBA: This is where I originally thought we'd have to drop lower than 35 and still might if our passing stats are too high after a week or two, but initial feedback seems solid. I see some ducked throws but not a ton. Given user defense is much tougher than CPU defense, I'm comfortable with 35 as a starting point but definitely could be moving this down as I get actual data rolling in.

WR Catch: Originally I had this at 51, actually... with SPD up to 60 and coverage at 65, I wanted to see fewer wide open guys BUT a lesser effect of WRs getting the ball jarred out from less than big hits. Was worried at 51 that offense would be too easy, but this is also one I'm likely to bump a point or two if it seems like OFF needs some help after wek 1.

Run game: May start this at 57 but still getting feedback from people. Generally I'm hearing that 56 is still a little hard, as you said, but I also know guys have unleashed 150+ yd games here as well. In my experience from the past two cycles of Madden, when our league YPC / rushing stats were dead on vs the NFL, guys thought rushing seemed "a bit hard." So 56-57 is going to be our starting point. If it feels hard, my experience says that's good. Not everyone is a top 5 rushing team. That said--like the rest, def something I am looking at bumping if the initial week's #s come in a little low.


Very much appreciate the feedback! This is the "feel" part of it which I never feel great about, ha. But as I said in the OP, we are starting our file on Friday and reg season on Tuesday, so after that I'll start reporting hard data & making adjustments accordingly.

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

Speed: 60
Stamina: I like 55, but we will start with 53. Generally, OL play 97-99 of their snaps barring an injury. I had to concede a higher stamina to keep OL realistic and not on the verge of red/grey in Q4.
Injury: 55. It's the bane of my existence. I would like to play on 60-65 for user games but most above 50 completely decimates the CPU teams (average 7 players injured/median 15)

I'll be curious how running goes for you all. In a couple user games vs one of our better players at 60 SPD / 53 RBK, we couldn't average better than ~1.5 ypc. Tiny sample size, but I've played him a number of times over the past couple cycles and it felt way too tough. I think I'll have to bump to 57 eventually but am going to start with 56.

[redsfan4life]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

I've played a few games running seems pretty difficult but I'm ok with that. This is the NFL 4 ypc is very solid. Passing doesn't feel a lot different from all-pro to me tbh, I'd say that defenders react quicker after the catch is made and in general but it's probably fine where it is imo. INT's might be a tad high, tackling feels fine. I am wondering why you lowered injury to 49? Just wondering if you were seeing too many injuries at 50 I've only played about 4 games and I saw a few injuries with it but nothing excessive. This is football after all.

Good work on the sliders, best of luck.

[Aestis]

Re: RFF's M17 Sim League USER v USER Sliders

I've played a few games running seems pretty difficult but I'm ok with that. This is the NFL 4 ypc is very solid. Passing doesn't feel a lot different from all-pro to me tbh, I'd say that defenders react quicker after the catch is made and in general but it's probably fine where it is imo. INT's might be a tad high, tackling feels fine. I am wondering why you lowered injury to 49? Just wondering if you were seeing too many injuries at 50 I've only played about 4 games and I saw a few injuries with it but nothing excessive. This is football after all.

Good work on the sliders, best of luck.

I've actually bumped it back up to 50 in the latest ver that we'll be rolling with when the file starts. I think it is fine for in-game. It feels a high for simmed games, lots of injuries if you have to sim.

I'm expecting INTs to start high as guys adjust to the game and learn to check down more. And yeah, I also don't think All Pro vs All Madden is drastically different when it comes to User v User games. I feel like running is tougher on AM and QBs are less accurate, and that's the main thing.

I'm actually still worried that offenses will be too powerful at 60 SPD and that I'll have to keep bumping that up to keep deep bombs in check. But I'll wait to see if that happens before acting.