Heh. FOF8 And Its Goofy-Looking MP Stats

[Ben E Lou]

With the play calling sections being scripted and many of us being "Set It And Forget It" game planners, I am getting minor amusement from some of the stats lines I'm seeing.

2062: http://www.fof-ihof.com/playercard.php?playerid=50798 ("Welcome to the league, good-looking young TE! You get to start every game and be nothing but a decoy!")

2018: TE Dylan Cox Player Details (http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=4240) (Starts every game, 1 target. I'm assuming that he missed the one start because of a turnover or long KOR putting us in the Red Zone and our first play from there isn't 2-TE.)

2062 & 2063: SE Tyrone Capoccia Player Details (http://www.fof-ihof.com/playercard.php?playerid=50862) (Dude, you might want to back off on force-targeting your 39RR guy...)

2017: TE Lamar Chatham Player Details (http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=414) (Mr. 95-RR TE runs around the field, usually open, on 424 pas plays, but QB says "EFF YOU, LAMAR!!!")

2017 Receiving: http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=1196 ("Luke, yeah, you caught 72 passes for 7.2 ypt last year, but this year we're going to focus on using you as only a SURPRISE receiver. See how well it worked, you improved to 8.9 ypt!!!")

2062: SE Adrian Marshall Player Details (http://www.fof-ihof.com/playercard.php?playerid=50897) (3.5 ypt force-feeding it to the low-RR rookie)

2016: RB Kenny Newton Player Details (http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=1638) (16 GS...0 carries...I assume he played FB in those starts...)

2016: http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=1641 (#1 TE....good bars...19 targets)

And my personal favorite: FL Marty Edens Player Details (http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/playercard.php?playerid=1784) ("Marty, you are my #1 guy...RR<10 and uber-low endurance be DAMNED!!!")

[Mobarak]

Lol, Newman says he was being overshadowed by Malik Burks. The new GM ( ME! =p ) gave him more snaps last season and he shined like diamond even with Burks as the starter..

[cleancoder42]

The Marty Edens one is pretty funny. Though, for as bad as his ratings are, he didn't do that bad. 6.4 YPT, and a BELCO ranking of 28.

[Julio Riddols]

I think there is a guy in one of my leagues with 140+ targets 8 games in. He is averaging 3.5 a target. The Leroy Hoard of receivers.

[Front Office Midget]

So... is FOF8 actually better than FOF7?

[Ben E Lou]

So... is FOF8 actually better than FOF7?Very much so for my tastes. In case it's not clear, the anomalies in this thread are pretty much all the results of humans setting odd custom game plans in MP and then leaving them in place all year.

[zsteelers]

for my liking, no doubt that FOF 8 >> FOF 7.

the game engine is very robust against obvious exploits, like targeting your best skill player an absurd number of times -- like Ben discusses in the posts above.

[MIJB#19]

Sadly I'm far from convinced yet. The AI does equally crazy things to my MP team.

I let the AI (with a top-notch staff) set my game plan for every game and usually need to rerun it at least 5 times to actually see a game plan that doesn't look completely stupid.
Most notable trend, on 3rd and 1 and 3rd and 2 it usually suggests 6 different plays for these 2 sections: 4 of those being passing plays (usually screen passes to players who can't catch a ball) and one of them being a QB counterplay run. That already happened when my team had one of the best (if not the best) 3rd down backs in the league with an above average run blocking unit (with the best run blocking C in the league) and the league's best OL cohesion, by a wide margin.
That's not a once every 20 tries situation, it happens on the majority of 'generate game plan' clicks. I don't want or expect us running up the middle every time, but never doing that makes no sense to me. Or maybe I'm missing something less obvious and my team is actually better suited to throw on 3rd and short and I'm blind for seeing it.

So far, it tells me that if I don't manually alter the play selections, my team will do crazy things on crucial 3rd down plays. Having seen this trend, I'm quite obviously worried about what happens in the other down and distance situations, I'm afraid the AI has no freaking clue how to set a half-decent game plan in FOF8 (or just as little as I do). The result is that I rex the game plan, but usually redo the 3rd and short situations. Quite frankly, I don't always have 30 minutes to spare to check my entire game plan for this kind of stupidity.

Fwiw, I was no game planning wonder in FOF7, I basically set a balanced game plan early in the FOF2007 era (rebuilt it in the FOF7 era) and stuck with it forever. I was hoping the FOF8 AI would actually utilize my players better than I ever could do in FOF7, but so far I don't see that happening.

[Ben E Lou]

That already happened when my team had one of the best (if not the best) 3rd down backs in the league with an above average run blocking unit (with the best run blocking C in the league) and the league's best OL cohesion, by a wide margin.I think you might have a scouting issue. My scouts have your best center as #6 in run blocking, and he was less than 30% KRB% in the first two FOF8 seasons. FWIW, from what I've gathered in FOF8 the collective is more important than just "get a great run blocking center" that worked well in FOF2K7 and FOF7. The rest of your line is, uh, a bit lacking. ;) Gs: 56 and 22, Ts 34 and 56. And remember that FOF8 is expecting starters to be a bit better than FOF7. My guess is that it's looking at your o-line and saying "can't run, so we have to pass." To check this, I just hit Rex on my CCFL team (http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/teampageroster.php?teamid=1), where I have a really good OL and a RB with 77 hole rec. Here's what it did on 3rd/4th 1/2

1: 5 runs, 1 play action (1 route)
2: 4 runs, 2 passes (1 route and 2 route)
3: 6 runs
4: 4 standard runs, 1 counter, 1 pass (Flat)
5: 3 runs, 3 passes (0,S, and Wheel, all with 2 yards to go)

One thing that I did notice in previous versions that I suspect has carried over is this: when Rex builds an offensive game plan, the logic appears to look first at "can we run?" and if no, then pass. In other words, if you put a team of a bunch of 30/30 guys on offense, even at QB and WR. My guess is that is still happening. It's a passing league and all that.

(FWIW, I'd be curious to see actuals, but my perception is that NFL teams throw it 50% or more on 3rd and 2.)

I've definitely moved on from "change a few plays to get my top guys the ball" to 100% custom offensive game plans in MP, ultimately if there are problems there, it's a non-issue for me, but based on the little experiment I just did with my CCFL team, I really do think it's an issue of Rex looking at your players and saying "we can't run the ball, so we have to throw." Looking at ypc for MAA in FOF8 (3.8, 3.94, 2.81,) I'd say that's not a crazy notion.

[Ben E Lou]

(FWIW, I'd be curious to see actuals, but my perception is that NFL teams throw it 50% or more on 3rd and 2.)Found this that indicates about 25% pass on 3rd and 1, about 60% pass on 3rd and 2.

Advanced Football Analytics (formerly Advanced NFL Stats): Play Calling on 3rd and Short Part 1 (http://archive.advancedfootballanalytics.com/2008/08/play-calling-on-3rd-and-short-part-1.html)

So I guess the expectation from those 6 plays should be 3 of each.

[Ben E Lou]

Heh. Just noticed that article was from 2008. I strongly suspect that there's more passing since if for no other reason than that there's notably more passing overall:

NFL Football Stats - NFL Team Passing Play Percentage on TeamRankings.com (https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/passing-play-pct?date=2009-02-02)

vs.

NFL Football Stats - NFL Team Passing Play Percentage on TeamRankings.com (https://www.teamrankings.com/nfl/stat/passing-play-pct?date=2017-02-06)


(NFL Milestone Note: It would appear that 2016 was the first time in history that every team in the league threw more than 50% of the time.)

[MIJB#19]

I think you might have a scouting issue. My scouts have your best center as #6 in run blocking, and he was less than 30% KRB% in the first two FOF8 seasons. FWIW, from what I've gathered in FOF8 the collective is more important than just "get a great run blocking center" that worked well in FOF2K7 and FOF7. The rest of your line is, uh, a bit lacking. ;) Gs: 56 and 22, Ts 34 and 56. And remember that FOF8 is expecting starters to be a bit better than FOF7. My guess is that it's looking at your o-line and saying "can't run, so we have to pass." To check this, I just hit Rex on my CCFL team (http://ccfl.fof-belco.com/teampageroster.php?teamid=1), where I have a really good OL and a RB with 77 hole rec. Here's what it did on 3rd/4th 1/2

1: 5 runs, 1 play action (1 route)
2: 4 runs, 2 passes (1 route and 2 route)
3: 6 runs
4: 4 standard runs, 1 counter, 1 pass (Flat)
5: 3 runs, 3 passes (0,S, and Wheel, all with 2 yards to go)

One thing that I did notice in previous versions that I suspect has carried over is this: when Rex builds an offensive game plan, the logic appears to look first at "can we run?" and if no, then pass. In other words, if you put a team of a bunch of 30/30 guys on offense, even at QB and WR. My guess is that is still happening. It's a passing league and all that.

(FWIW, I'd be curious to see actuals, but my perception is that NFL teams throw it 50% or more on 3rd and 2.)

I've definitely moved on from "change a few plays to get my top guys the ball" to 100% custom offensive game plans in MP, ultimately if there are problems there, it's a non-issue for me, but based on the little experiment I just did with my CCFL team, I really do think it's an issue of Rex looking at your players and saying "we can't run the ball, so we have to throw." Looking at ypc for MAA in FOF8 (3.8, 3.94, 2.81,) I'd say that's not a crazy notion.I'm fine with my staff's scouting being wrong (in this case most likely it isn't), the key thing here is that if my staff thinks my team has the best run blocking OL player in the league playing at C, that should be in favor of running up the middle more often than the average team. It made a lot more sense to balance it out or mostly run in short yardage situations, like my team used to do in FOF7. With a weaker OL (said C being suspended, rookies replaced retired/over the hill players, etc, etc.), I'd still expect the AI to try to use our non-weakness.

If we're taking the other route and assume the AI doesn't recognize the strengths (or weaknesses), I'd still hope to see a more balanced approach or actually see us throwing the ball to our WR1 (35 targets in 185 passing plays, ouch). And I think you can see where my worries about the AI's ability to make a game plan come from.

Point being, I don't think the goofiness you're seeing is exclusive to human built game plans, what I'm tempted to conclude so far is the AI has no clue what to do either.

[MIJB#19]

Digging deeper into my own discomfort with the game, I'm starting to realize it could be a case of having a Playbook mismatch. Trying to construct a Game Plan, I'm missing the ability to run the kind of formations/plays I was used to see used in FOF7. After all, without a Playbook that suits the team, it's equally impossible for the AI to make good suggestions for plays to run.
That doesn't take away my disappointment. For example, it's quite surprising to see the AI didn't add any 230 running plays to the playbook, which are typical for a short yardage situation. Something that can't be fixed mid-season.

[Sharkn20]

Digging deeper into my own discomfort with the game, I'm starting to realize it could be a case of having a Playbook mismatch. Trying to construct a Game Plan, I'm missing the ability to run the kind of formations/plays I was used to see used in FOF7. After all, without a Playbook that suits the team, it's equally impossible for the AI to make good suggestions for plays to run.
That doesn't take away my disappointment. For example, it's quite surprising to see the AI didn't add any 230 running plays to the playbook, which are typical for a short yardage situation. Something that can't be fixed mid-season.

Once you have a system that suits you, or the players to run the playbook, you will startto enjoy.

In regards of the 35 targets to ur star WR, did you chdck how many targets were taken away because he was double covered and the QB threw to the 2nd option?? Does your Top WR has excellent RR skills??

[MIJB#19]

Once you have a system that suits you, or the players to run the playbook, you will startto enjoy.

In regards of the 35 targets to ur star WR, did you chdck how many targets were taken away because he was double covered and the QB threw to the 2nd option?? Does your Top WR has excellent RR skills??As mentioned in my last reply, I think not having the right plays to run a game plan that suits the team, also will hurt my chances to reach my WR1. Fwiw, my WR1 is a top10 Route Runner. If we're reading the game correctly, my WR3 and has top3 RR should technically draw the double coverage. ;)

[Sharkn20]

As mentioned in my last reply, I think not having the right plays to run a game plan that suits the team, also will hurt my chances to reach my WR1. Fwiw, my WR1 is a top10 Route Runner. If we're reading the game correctly, my WR3 and has top3 RR should technically draw the double coverage. ;)

That's not the case anymore like in FOF7. If you select double 2nd best WR then your WR1 will get the double coverages.

Alsp the algorythm has changed somehow and double coverages whon't always be applied to the WR with better RR...