Player potential, to hide or not to hide

[Tito78]

"The “potential” rating is another sort of ‘hidden’ addition that we are changing up this year to impact progression (and Franchise mode overall). Every player in the game has a potential rating that he cannot exceed (a la NFL Head Coach 09). This year, we’re actually exposing that rating so you’ll have an idea why your player is not progressing - typically a situation where his potential is maxed out. Exposing this rating also help quite a bit in making personnel decisions when contracts are up. One key detail here is that you’ll only see potential for players on your own team. CPU player potentials will be hidden."

- Josh Looman
Senior Designer, Madden NFL 10

Would you rather know the full potential of a player in franchise, or would you rather have that rating hidden, and have your scouts project(accurately or inaccurately) what his potential may be ?

[rudyjuly2]

Hidden. I like the way the Madden team is doing it. You can see them on your own players (since you see them practice every day and get a good idea) but don't know the cpu players.

[RGiles36]

I gotta get my hands on Head Coach so I can get a feel for what the hell everyone is talking about. No seriously, I get the gist of it. But threads are popping up about randomized rookies as opposed to pre-determined rookies, player potential, etc. It raises my antennas for Head Coach.

[Tito78]

Quote: Originally Posted by rudyjuly2

Hidden. I like the way the Madden team is doing it. You can see them on your own players (since you see them practice every day and get a good idea) but don't know the cpu players.

When I say hidden, I mean hidden from the user, period. It would take a lot of fun out of franchise mode if you draft a player in the 6th round, and can you tell that he has the potential to be a 99 overall(Tom Brady). It be better for the potential of a player be hidden, so you don't know ahead time that your future franchise QB is currently your back up. No one thought that Brady would be what he was when he first started playing. Otherwise they would've been grooming him to start from the get go. They also would have picked him a lot earlier than the sixth round.

[FadeEmAll]

Quote: Originally Posted by rgiles36

I gotta get my hands on Head Coach so I can get a feel for what the hell everyone is talking about. No seriously, I get the gist of it. But threads are popping up about randomized rookies as opposed to pre-determined rookies, player potential, etc. It raises my antennas for Head Coach.

Trust me you will probably be disappointed. Good premise but I can't get down with a video game I can't play...

[Tito78]

Quote: Originally Posted by rgiles36

I gotta get my hands on Head Coach so I can get a feel for what the hell everyone is talking about. No seriously, I get the gist of it. But threads are popping up about randomized rookies as opposed to pre-determined rookies, player potential, etc. It raises my antennas for Head Coach.

Basically, when you draft or sign a player in free agency, their potential, which is essentially the overall rating that they can't ever exceed is revealed to you. It's tells you the highest overall rating that the player in question will ever have; there's no guarantee that he'll reach that overall rating, but it's guaranteed that he'll never exceed it.

I'm not against a rating ceiling, I just don't think that the actual rating ceiling or potential cap should be revealed to the user at all.
It will take a lot of fun and suspense out of the franchise mode.

[Obelysk]

I think a lot of people are confused about this POT thing I will try to explain it. Lets say there are 2 QBs you draft in the 7th round. They both end up having a 71 rating. Now here is where the POT rating comes in to play, one of the QB has a 95 POT while the other one has a 75 POT. What does that mean? It means that if you start the QB that has a 95 POT eventually he will progress his overall rating from 71 to 95 at the peak of his career (it may take years to get to 95). On the other hand the other QB not matter what he does he will never exceed the 75 overall rating because that is his sealing. What people are discusing is whether to allow people to see that POT rating for a player so if you drafted both of this QBs you would never know which one of them can become the next Tom Brady and which one will be a career backup.

[94niners]

It depends on what "potential" means in the context of Madden.

If, say, a high potential means that a player MIGHT progress more than a player with a low potential would, then keep it UNhidden. After all, NFL scouts can make decent estimations about whether or not a player has the potential to be much better than they are coming out of college.

Alex Smith, for example, doesn't really know how to play QB in an NFL offense (yet), but he is obviously a very gifted athlete at the position (during team sprint drills this off season, he always finished in the top 5... this is a QB out running most of his team mates: he has a strong enough arm, etc).

Conversely, Shaun Hill (the current 49er starter) is exactly the opposite: not nearly as physically gifted, but he gets the mental aspect of the position in a Pro Offense.


So, I would say here that Shaun Hill has a higher overall rating but Alex Smith has a higher potential. In real life we can be rather confident that this is the case.

Potential is not hidden from the eyes of scouts in this case.




If, however, potential is the MAX that a player will progress to (i.e. if a player's rating is 75 but his potential is 90, and you therefore know that he will eventually progress to a 90 overall), then this definitely should be hidden.









In other words, I would prefer the potential thing to not directly match the eventual rating the player will have. Have some random element to it.

For example, a player with a rating of 75 with a potential of 90 may end up , as a max rating during his career, anywhere from:

75 to 90 ± n (where n is some random small number, like 1, 2, ... n), with, since he has a high potential rating, there being a higher probability that he will be on the high side of this spectrum (if he starts at 75, then obviously his MAX rating cannot be lower than 75).


He might have a 10% chance of staying at 75 or going down

a 20% chance of progressing to 78 ≤ x < 80

a 30% chance of progressing to 80 ≤ x < 82

a 50% chance of progressing to 82 ≤ x < 86

a 60% chance of progressing to 86 ≤ x < 89

a 50% chance of progressing to 89 ≤ x < 91

a 30% chance of progressing to 91 ≤ x < 93

a 20% chance of progressing to 93 ≤ x 94

a 10% chance of progressing to ≈ 95


Of course, this was all fast and off the top of my head, but SOME waited function, where there is a random factor and a factor determined by performance, along with the restrictions put on by the "potential" rating, that go into determine exactly how far a rookie progresses.

The function of probability on the y axis and rating on the x axis should look like this:

• Note: This is NOT a graph of time vs. rating. There is no element of time in this graph. It is simply a graph of the PROBABILITY of getting a final rating vs the final rating.

With a potential of 95, and and overall rating of 75 to start, it is clear that the most likely scenario is that the player will progress to somewhere between 85 and 90. There is a CHANCE that he will progress to 95, but it is less likely than him progressing to 90.

For a player with a 99 potential rating and a 75 overall rating, he should have the highest probability of landing near 95.


Now, for an 85 overall with a 95 potential, he has a better chance of landing on 95 than a 75 overall player would in this model. This makes sense because, how often do really crappy players become great? Not often.




For those who want to skip to the end...

If there is a random factor, but yet some restrictions where you can make a fairly reasonable guess about an INTERVAL that the player will eventually progress to, then I am FINE with having the potential rating visible (like say you can know where the player will progress to ± 10 rating points).

If, on the other hand, by looking at the potential rating you can know EXACTLY what rating the player will progress to, then I say HIDE IT.

Quote: Originally Posted by Obelysk

I think a lot of people are confused about this POT thing I will try to explain it. Lets say there are 2 QBs you draft in the 7th round. They both end up having a 71 rating. Now here is where the POT rating comes in to play, one of the QB has a 95 POT while the other one has a 75 POT. What does that mean? It means that if you start the QB that has a 95 POT eventually he will progress his overall rating from 71 to 95 at the peak of his career (it may take years to get to 95). On the other hand the other QB not matter what he does he will never exceed the 75 overall rating because that is his sealing. What people are discusing is whether to allow people to see that POT rating for a player so if you drafted both of this QBs you would never know which one of them can become the next Tom Brady and which one will be a career backup.

If that is the case I want it hidden.

There MUST be a random factor involved in this algorithm.