TCY 2 wishlist/suggestions

[cthomer5000]

With basically no FOF talk around here, and my re-ignited passion for TCY and my Rutgers dynasty (With basically no FOF talk around here, and my re-ignited passion for TCY and my ) I thought it might be interesting to start a wishlist of features us players would like to see in TCY 2. We don't know when this game will be made, but I think we're all fairly certain it's inevitable.

Off the top of my head, here's what i'd like to see:
some sort of conference editor tool, allowing you to set up the conferences how you'd like before starting your career
a bowl matchup editor, allowing you to edit bowl matchups, automatic berths, etc. I think this should be an option before the beginning of each season. This way you could add or remove teams based on the growing or weakening state of individual conferences

A lot of minor things will probably come to me later...

I have to say, after a lot of play with this game it's harder to see room for improvement than in FOF4. I think TCY (post summer patch) is probably the tightest game Jim has made.

[A-Husker-4-Life]

TCY is Jim's best, but it needs an update... here are some idea's;

-Add coaches contracts and extensions...

-Spring ball, have a scrimage at the end and box scores...So you call figure out who the starters are...

-Advanced recruiting, be able to get Juco's and when some recruites don't qualify grade-wise they would be sent to Juco schools...

-Add the media, make so you have to explain your wins or losses to the media...

-have the ability to take to make adjustments in the gameplay/roster at halftime...

-Practices, your team will run one everyday...

-Hall of fame for all the coaches in the league...

-have the ability to see your players high school stats throughout the whole game, not just in recruiting...

-Be able to set a depth chart for special teams(Kickoff team, ect...)

-have your depth-chart change with the offense you choose... Currently when you run the single-back you have a spot for the FB....

that about it, but I will think of more.....

[illinifan999]

-How about a High-School All-American page

-I don't like how sometimes the #1 player in the nation isn't All-Country

-I'd like to maybe win Coach of they Year once

- I'd really like it if when the board is nice enough to build a new stadium after 10 years of sellouts at 44k, they don't drop it to 30k.

[Noop]

1. Scouting reports - I'd like to know everything about the player I'm trying to sign. Example: Joe Blow runs a 4.4 according to his highschool coach we clocked at times of 4.38, 4.43, 4.44 . Coach Noop I believe Joe can be a very good player on the defensive side of the ball. But I feel he a player who needs the ball in his hands in order to make things happen. Also he made sure to tell me he's a huge Florida State fan.

2. Impact players the as incoming freshman they are ready to set the world on fire.

3. I want to vote in coaching polls.

4. If I dont make to a BCS I want to either accept or decline a bowl invation. Example: I've been to the gator bowl 4 years running I want to be able to accept another bowl bid.

5. Not every highschool football player has a 3.5 1300+ grades in school so make it a lil bit more real.

6. The addition of the once in a while two way player who is actually good at both postions.

7. Spring Practice

8. Preseason preview of the conference of your choice(including your own.)

:)

noop

[cthomer5000]

expanding on the thoughts of others and adding some of my own:

Maybe something all the FOF games could use is practice. We could hear reports on how players are looking, who's got a bad attitude, who got injured while practicing, who's out of shape, etc. use your imagination.

I certainly wouldn't mind a special teams depth chart. It would allow me to make sure some starters either definitely were or definitely were not on those units.

Different 'skins' for each type of base offense is a good idea as well. It's annoying staring at that FB spot in my single back offense. I would be better suited to having a 3rd starting WR slot and a larger bench of WR reserves. For that matter, maybe there could be different sets of minimum roster requirements for each type of base offense. Why should I have to carry any FB's in a run-and-shoot offense?

I think just like the base offense in TCY that you should have to choose a base defense. At the very least he should bring in the "level of familiarity" concept from FOF2001. I don't think I should be able to move from a 46 to a 3-4 to a 4-3 in 3 straight weeks without consequence.

coach of the year needs to be fixed.

I think the staidum process needs to be overhauled. Perhaps there should be some sort of proposal involved? I realize that wouldn't really be how things work in college sports, but down sizing a stadium when you're selling out isn't exactly realistic either.

[EagleFan]

Player editor of some sort would be nice.

Contracts for coaches. Another great addition but would require a change to FOF would be the ability for a coach to go pro.

The ability to sim off several season without having to be a coach of a team to be able to generate some history. That way you don't get hammerred for your record when you have it on autopilot.

Possible conference realignment.

Generate a scouting report for the players that go into the pro draft.

Ability to vote in coaches' poll.

Ability to not have the SCE in the league. I don't mind it being there but it would be nice to have the option not to have it there.

Maybe a way to have kids become a part of football. Something that tells if the player's father was a college player of the past. That would be just for atmosphere, but could add quite a bit to it for some. You see that the son of a quarterback who led you to a championship 20 years ago is now a high school senior and playing football, that type of thing.


Just a few things off the top of my head.

[Ben E Lou]

I mentioned this in another thread.

First off, I'd like to see 40 times and bench press added to recruits.

I'd like to see a third rating added to each high school, something like, "accurate information." In other words, each high school coach would have a reputation for how accurate his reporting of 40 times, bench press, etc. is.

Each school would have the option of hosting summer camps for high school players and/or teams, as is done in real life. (Kids I know just got back from 7-on-7 team passing camp at Auburn. Several linemen are going to an individual lineman camp at Furman in a couple of weeks. Etc. etc. etc.) You'd have MUCH more accurate and reliable info on players who attend your school's camp(s). Of course, these camps would cost $$$ to put on (recruiting points perhaps?)

Each recruit (perhaps based on his aspiration rating) should have the ability to significantly improve or decline between signing day and the beginning of the next season. (For example, Jabari Davis gained 20-25 pounds of mostly fat between the time he signed with Tennessee and the time he showed up on campus. On the flip side, Andrew Childers has already gained 10-15 pounds of muscle since he signed with Samford--many of y'all saw his picture from a couple of weeks ago.)

[Anrhydeddu]

SkyDog, your suggestions all assume that if these extra ratings were there, the AI would know what to do with them or that would even make a difference in differentiating players.

[cthomer5000]

I agree on the removal of the option of not having the SOL 8. An option to not have it and instead have maybe 1 or 2 fake teams to fix scheduling issues would be fine with me. Another good idea would be to have a choice of preset conferences for the SOL 8, I remember someone (on the old board) doing the legwork to mak a bunch of options for how you could make the conference out of teams that exist in I-AA in real life. If there were pre-made conferences to select from, it would be a nice option.

I'd imagine the dwindling number of independents will become a real obstacle for Jim in making the next version. There's only going to be 2 or 3 within 3 years. Can anyone correct me on this? There are 4 now, but U-Conn and Troy State are on their way to conferences. Has Temple come up with anything after the end of their Big East run? Anyway, making the independents a pseudo-conference would be much tougher with just Navy and Notre Dame.

Recruiting could probably become more layered. Perhaps you could have some options like:
mass mailing vs. handwritten letter
speaking with their coach
summer camps (as SkyDog suggested)

clearly you would assign dollar or "recruiting point" values to things like this.

JUCO transfers would be nice, but i could see how it might take a ton of work to add them.

[cthomer5000]

Originally posted by Anrhydeddu
SkyDog, your suggestions all assume that if these extra ratings were there, the AI would know what to do with them or that would even make a difference in differentiating players.

I think you can assume that's implied. Do we really need to tack on "and the AI would take advantage of and understand this feature" to every suggestion?

[scooper]

SkyDog, speaking of recruiting camps, to your knowledge is Thomas Brown camping at ND? They seem to be beating the bushes in GA pretty hard so far, especially for running backs.

[Anrhydeddu]

cthomer, I think so because as we have clearly seen in FOF, it cannot even be assumed that the AI can adequately manage even the basic ratings and financial information, let alone the more subtle ratings. Now whether this directly applies to TCY (it does to FOF), I don't know, it's been too long.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally posted by scooper
SkyDog, speaking of recruiting camps, to your knowledge is Thomas Brown camping at ND? They seem to be beating the bushes in GA pretty hard so far, especially for running backs. To my knowledge, no. I think he's going to individual camps at FSU and UGA, and that's about all that is left. Practice starts here in just 3 weeks.

[scooper]

Thanks, hopefully Ty gets him on campus anyway. :D Good luck to the young man, regardless. It seems there is a lot of talent in Georgia this year.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally posted by scooper
Thanks, hopefully Ty gets him on campus anyway. :D Good luck to the young man, regardless. It seems there is a lot of talent in Georgia this year. Well, at times he's said that ND is one of his top 5, and at times he hasn't. (As we've discussed regarding TCY recruiting, we ARE talking about the fickleness of a 17-year-old kid here...) As is the case with most kids, when he goes to a camp and meets a coach, that school's stock increases for a while, but then the next camp/coach looks good as well....

If I had to guess, I'd say he'd end up at Maryland or Georgia....but I sure wouldn't put any $$$ on it.

[scooper]

Originally posted by cthomer5000

I'd imagine the dwindling number of independents will become a real obstacle for Jim in making the next version. There's only going to be 2 or 3 within 3 years. Can anyone correct me on this? There are 4 now, but U-Conn and Troy State are on their way to conferences. Has Temple come up with anything after the end of their Big East run? Anyway, making the independents a pseudo-conference would be much tougher with just Navy and Notre Dame.



Very good point. Scheduling would have to be handled differently. I like the way it's handled now, but there could be improvement. I'm an ND fan, but I don't play with them because I don't like the schedule. It's not a big deal to me, I play with somebody else. I actually enjoy using teams from parts of the country that I'm not geographically as familiar with.

No, by the way, I was not one of the Irish fans that complained to Jim about the independant conferece when the game was released. I understood the limitaions of scheduling in the game and I accepted it. It will be interesting to see how only two independents are treated.

[cthomer5000]

Originally posted by scooper
It will be interesting to see how only two independents are treated.

I'm sure Jim will be tempted to just hit 'delete.' it would probably be much easier on him. Instead it might have to be N.D, Navy, and a few fictional teams making up the conference.

[scooper]

Originally posted by cthomer5000
I'm sure Jim will be tempted to just hit 'delete.' it would probably be much easier on him. Instead it might have to be N.D, Navy, and a few fictional teams making up the conference.

Good idea. Those fictional teams would replace the SCE. He's said many times, TCY is his college football world, not a simulation of the real thing.

[condors]

i may have missed it if someone said it earlier but playcalling is an option i would want

[Leonidas]

- I like the idea of adding physical skills to recruiting (40 times, bench press, etc).

- Playcalling

- Change to HOF to allow players who didn't start all 4 years. You could have the greatest player ever, but unless he was one of those rare players to start as a true freshman, no Hall.

- Bowl Matchup editor (I really get sick of going to the same bowl game every year in a dynasty)

- Do something to fix inflated player ratings when they go pro (not sure if this is a FOF problem or TCY). I am sick of drafting 7th round guys who have ratings in the 70-80's.

- There should be a recruiting feature that allows you to take recruits to strip clubs.

[Karim]

I know nothing about college football, nor do I follow it, but TCY was a very enjoyable game. I really enjoy being able to take over a lousy team/organization and try and mold it into a winner. Of all of Solecismic's games, this was the only one I really found a challenge without house rules. The best I managed was to take a Solecismic Eight Spokane College to #19 in the country.

There are only two things I really would want to see in a new version.

1) There really needs to be an elaborate recruit filter. I spent way too much time with pencil and paper. If I want to list all LBs over 6'0, with a 1000+ SAT, a 75+ athletic prep, a 50+ academic prep, a 3.30 GPA+, with at least 30 tackles in their last year in high school, who live in the northwest, I should be able to do this.

2) This may go agains the way it is done in real life, but I really do wish recruiting was not intermingled with games. Taking #1 into consideration, it was a lot of manual work (at least for the way I played) to switch between the two "in-game features". It would have been more pleasant if I could simply concentrate on recruiting in the off-season.

[Noop]

bump!!

:)

noop

[tucker342]

The big thing for me is ability to change conference alinment, ability to edit players, coaching contracts, stadium shouldn't get smaller after selling out a 44,000 seat stadium for 10 straight years, also more info in recruiting.

[cthomer5000]

a few more minor suggestions:


Pre-season all-american teams
redshirt freshman being eligible for freshman team awards (it works that way in real life... right?)
keep the "Joe Blow is concerned that you have a freshman at his position" but also add "playing time" as a full criteria in player's decision making. there's got to be more than academics, distance, and prestige involved.

[Solecismic]

Really good stuff here, thanks guys.

Here's a question for those of you who are still into the game:

I've received many comments that the process of allocating a player's free-time, weight-room time, etc... is rather tedious. Some have advocated a screen where you can set the time for everyone in a position group at once. But the huge differences in free-time requirements for those in academic trouble and those with girlfriends makes that solution somewhat inadequate. Are there any suggestions for how that can be handled gracefully?

No idea what to do with the independents as they disappear. Just the dynamic scheduling of two games for each team is about the most complicated code in the entire game. It's hard to imagine going to three games, let alone a full season.

If there's a TCY2, I think the solution will be to give those teams more permanent opponents and just call them independents without a bowl tie. Hoping the ratings algorithm properly rewards Notre Dame for success against a tougher schedule. I don't think that would be too hard, as there's plenty of room for permanent non-conference games with the smaller conferences like the Big East and the Mountain West.

I am really hating Donna Shalalalala right now. Dynamic conference affiliations would essentially require a completely new and far more complex scheduling algorithm.

[rexallllsc]

I would say just continue to perfect the actual game engine, as well as the recruiting aspect (look at the rosters of teams like UCLA...most of the players are from CA and surrounding states), include playcalling, and make the pbp scroll (ootp) or progress (cm) to build tension.

For example:

Smith back to pass
(.5 second pause)
Smith evades the USC rush and rolls out of the pocket to his right...
(1 second pause)
...he's looking deep for Jackson!...
(1.5 second pause to simulate the ball being in the air)
...He's got it!
(.5 second pause)
He's gonna take it in!
(.5 second pause)
Smith to Jackson for a 52 yard strike! UCLA leads 7-0!

I think that builds awesome immersion...add in some generic crowd noise when the ball is in the air, and a roar when the ball is caught, or a groan when the play is broken up, a run is stuffed, etc...

Just my $.02

[sabotai]

"I've received many comments that the process of allocating a player's free-time, weight-room time, etc... is rather tedious. Some have advocated a screen where you can set the time for everyone in a position group at once. But the huge differences in free-time requirements for those in academic trouble and those with girlfriends makes that solution somewhat inadequate. Are there any suggestions for how that can be handled gracefully?"

A member of the community created a program (TCY Helper?) that would suggest time allocations. Basically, you would set the practice time, the relaxation time for with/without gf and there are two equations that handled study time based on the students academic attributes and the weight room/football study times based on positions.

I'm sure someone can give you a link to the program to take a look at. Something like that would be MUCH prefered to having to do each player individually.

[TUpei]

I have to use notepad to keep track of my recuiting and staff records. It would be nice to have a place in the game to make notes on players, recruits, staff, etc.

I would like to save all the messages that pop up during recuiting. For instance, when you first contacted him did he say he was pleased, surprised, or what.

This is a great game. Keep trying to make it more realistic. Don't screw it up by turning it into a video game.

[CHEMICAL SOLDIER]

I for one hope Jim does a different sport such as basketball or even hockey .

[cthomer5000]

Originally posted by Solecismic
]Here's a question for those of you who are still into the game:

I've received many comments that the process of allocating a player's free-time, weight-room time, etc... is rather tedious. Some have advocated a screen where you can set the time for everyone in a position group at once. But the huge differences in free-time requirements for those in academic trouble and those with girlfriends makes that solution somewhat inadequate. Are there any suggestions for how that can be handled gracefully?

I'll admit I was one of those who initially felt overwhelmed by the time I spent manging players time (the irony!), but realized it isn't all that bad. I make sure I have all the options off for coach involvement so the time settings carry over from year to year. I cruise through the upper-classmen and make changes only where needed (players bordering on failing a class), and then set the time for my new freshman. I'd imagine a lot of the problem is coming from people re-setting the time for every player every year. If you know what you're doing you don't have to adjust more than 20 players from year to year.

As far as coming up with a quick system for mass-management, I don't have any real suggestions. You're absolutely right about the huge differences between players - I personally couldn't fathom having the time settings for a cornerback with a 1500 SAT score vs. a guy who clocked in a 990. I'd either be wasting the smart guys' time in the classroom, or the moron would be failing out of school.

[cthomer5000]

Originally posted by TUpei
I would like to save all the messages that pop up during recuiting. For instance, when you first contacted him did he say he was pleased, surprised, or what.


Not a bad idea at all. I honestly tend to forget things like "Joe Blow loved/hated your offensive coordinator" because it isn't marked anywhere. Also, the fact that it isn't recorded anywhere leads me to undervalue the players feelings about my coach.

that leads me to another suggestion: Only have players comment on the relevant coordinator. I've recruited many running backs who couldn't stand my Defensive Coordinator - was this intentional? It just seems to me like a player would probably only meet and be concerned with whoever will end up coaching them personally.

[Runtheball]

(D'oh! Posted this in the wrong thread the first time...)

Here are a few of the ideas I've read on this thread, that I just want to agree with. A few of my own ideas are at the end of this post.

-- have the ability to take to make adjustments in the gameplay/roster at halftime...

-- There should be a recruiting feature that allows you to take recruits to strip clubs. ;-}

-- There really needs to be an elaborate recruit filter. I spent way too much time with pencil and paper. If I want to list all LBs over 6'0, with a 1000+ SAT, a 75+ athletic prep, a 50+ academic prep, a 3.30 GPA+, with at least 30 tackles in their last year in high school, who live in the northwest, I should be able to do this.

-- I would say just continue to perfect the actual game engine, as well as the recruiting aspect (look at the rosters of teams like UCLA...most of the players are from CA and surrounding states), include playcalling, and make the pbp scroll (ootp) or progress (cm) to build tension.

For example:

Smith back to pass
(.5 second pause)
Smith evades the USC rush and rolls out of the pocket to his right...
(1 second pause)
... etc. etc. etc.

(I LOVE this idea, but if it would significantly delay the release of TCY2, I could certainly live without it)


The following are my own comments, from a previous thread...

-- I recall in one of his interviews Jim said that TCY needed a playcalling interface, like the one he put in FOF4. I wonder what TCY fans would say about that. Personally, I like the (FOF4) playcalling interface, but don't think TCY "needs" it. I think the main thing that it "needs" is better AI clock management and playcalling. I'm so sick of my offensive coordinator (with terrific playcalling skills) calling for long passes when we are winning by less than 7 and have the ball with less than two minutes left in the game. (Also hate it when my Def Coord calls time out while we're down by 40 points and opponent has the ball inside our 20 with less than 2 minutes left).

-- I'd also like to see the players that are already on my roster evaluated not by the local scout, but by a consensus of the entire staff (which would rely partly on the local scout's ability, partly on the ability of the scout that was involved in recruiting the player, and partly on the basis of the player's on-field performance). Once the player is on my team and has been in a few games, shouldn't the entire staff have a say in the player's evaluation?

Can't wait to see TCY2, and would be willing to pay for it in advance of completion if that would help bring this project to the top of Jim's "to-do list".

[QuikSand]

Originally posted by Solecismic
I've received many comments that the process of allocating a player's free-time, weight-room time, etc... is rather tedious. Some have advocated a screen where you can set the time for everyone in a position group at once. But the huge differences in free-time requirements for those in academic trouble and those with girlfriends makes that solution somewhat inadequate. Are there any suggestions for how that can be handled gracefully?

Hmmmm... how about some kind of "general instructions" that might mesh with handing over these responsibilities to the coaching staff?

Something like "radio buttons" (perish the thought that I suggest sliders) for things like "Extra classroom time for students with poor grades" and "Extra free time for players with girlfriends" and that sort of thing - let me set some sort of overall strategy, and then let me hand over the responsibility to my coaches (with some confidence that they will do okay with it). I guess the list would need to be subtle to make it work - there should be some thought that goes into deciding what to use. Maybe including offsetting options like "Extra strength training" versus "Extra film study" as global options, in this same vein.

Then, perhaps, alow me to go back and edit one player at a time, after my coachign staff has done the general legwork.

[Leonidas]

Just thought of some more stuff, besides the thing about taking recruits to see strippers (popular in Alabama). I always got so sick of how walk-ons were handled. I generally liked how they were rated as players, but it just killed me to get a good walk on who would kill my academic rating because I couldn't change his study time. Either allow us to tweak their personal time numbers in the middle of the season or just give us 20 extra walkons for every team at the start of each season. Teams usually have around 65 players, not enough if you redshirt much of your incoming class.

Another possibility, set rosters in line with college. Give us the same recruting rules too. Instead of only getting 16 recruites, we could have up to 25, roster permitting. Then have 75 total full scholarships. Get real tricky, let us have a split scholarship option. So say you have 70 guys on a full ride, then you could split 5 full scholarships into 10-half scholarships to make some of the walk-ons happy. This is how it's done in the real thing. Get real cute and maybe have a track guy or basketball guy already on a full ride come over and take some snaps.

[scooper]

Originally posted by Leonidas


Another possibility, set rosters in line with college. Give us the same recruting rules too. Instead of only getting 16 recruites, we could have up to 25, roster permitting. Then have 75 total full scholarships.

This was addressed, I believe, when the original came out. True scholarship limit is 85. To have it true to life, you have to consider that is an extra 25 guys multiplied by over 100 teams. Plus the recruit pool would have to be much larger to support it. You would then be dealing with a much larger game and permance issues pop up.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally posted by scooper
This was addressed, I believe, when the original came out. True scholarship limit is 85. To have it true to life, you have to consider that is an extra 25 guys multiplied by over 100 teams. Plus the recruit pool would have to be much larger to support it. You would then be dealing with a much larger game and permance issues pop up. Counterpoint:

When TCY came out, I was playing it on a P2, 475MHz machine with 128 Megs of RAM. I'm now playing on a P4, 2.4GHz, 512 Meg Ram machine. I wouldn't have wanted my system to handle a larger game back then, but my current system could easily handle a good bit more. I'll bet that is true for a whole lot of folks. Even if TCY2 is Jim's next project and comes out next year, my current 2.4GHz system will be an average-to-low-end setup, and I'd have NO problem running a significantly bigger game on it.

[scooper]

Originally posted by SkyDog
Counterpoint:

When TCY came out, I was playing it on a P2, 475MHz machine with 128 Megs of RAM. I'm now playing on a P4, 2.4GHz, 512 Meg Ram machine. I wouldn't have wanted my system to handle a larger game back then, but my current system could easily handle a good bit more. I'll bet that is true for a whole lot of folks. Even if TCY2 is Jim's next project and comes out next year, my current 2.4GHz system will be an average-to-low-end setup, and I'd have NO problem running a significantly bigger game on it.

Yes, but, I'm still playing on an old system. :mad:

Of course it's a good chance that will change by the time TCY2 ever comes about.

[cthomer5000]

A week-to-week "Heisman watch" would be nice, listing players who would be in consideration as of that point in the year.

[cthomer5000]

In my opinion, it would be interesting if the Power Poll (BCS) and computer rankings weren't available until week 9 or 10 of the season. This would be closer to real life where the BCS matchups can only be speculated until the actual rankings are released. One definite positive would be avoiding the crazy polls of the first 3-4 weeks where teams rocket up and down the charts. I think it would add a little drama, but I bet a lot of players would rather have those rankings there all season long.

It's easier to come up with these suggestions as I'm playing the game. :p

[sjshaw]

Originally posted by TUpei
I would like to save all the messages that pop up during recuiting. For instance, when you first contacted him did he say he was pleased, surprised, or what.

I agree 100% and hope this is someday included.

[33sherman]

No idea what to do with the independents as they disappear. Just the dynamic scheduling of two games for each team is about the most complicated code in the entire game. It's hard to imagine going to three games, let alone a full season.

Maybe if there was a game option that could be set to indicate that you wanted a twelve game season instead of eleven, even if that meant just one more permanent non-conference opponent?

[NYFAN]

Jim, in response to your question. What about a screen that has a check box for every conceivable thing a player might take into account (a check box for every position, for a GPA range, a GF/or not, etc...) and then under it you can allocate their time. This way the user has the ability to allocate time anyway he likes, for any diversity of player. For instance I could check the boxes "WR", "DB", "w/ GF", "GPA 3-3.5" and then allocate time, thus allocating the time for all WRs and DBs with a girlfriend and a gpa between 3.0 and 3.5.

[Runtheball]

Originally posted by Solecismic
Here's a question for those of you who are still into the game:

I've received many comments that the process of allocating a player's free-time, weight-room time, etc... is rather tedious. Some have advocated a screen where you can set the time for everyone in a position group at once. But the huge differences in free-time requirements for those in academic trouble and those with girlfriends makes that solution somewhat inadequate. Are there any suggestions for how that can be handled gracefully?

[/B]

Jim,
I keep trying, but can't think of any way to handle the process that would not involve radically changing the current method. It really isn't that bad right now, and I hope you don't make any dramatic changes to the process itself. Having to spend alot of time allocating time to the players actually seems to add to my enjoyment of the game because it forces me to "get to know" them and I have more of an interest in their individual progress.

It would be nice if you could streamline the process with fewer mouse clicks...maybe try to put all the info needed to make time allocation decisions for all players in one position group on the screen at the same time. So we could still make individual adjustments to each of our TE/WR, but all in the same window without having several mouse clicks to switch from player to player.

[Hijinx]

There's a ton of good suggestions in this thread.

Playcalling interface

enhanced recruiting search filter (I recruit heavily based on good grades)

ability to send out mail to recruits (recruits can respond positively, negatively, or just ignore?)

Summer recruiting camps - maybe a general camp that's an open invite, and an elite-style invite only camp?

Coaching contracts for assistants

Recruits who decommit/ability to recruit commits off of other commit lists (now this would make it a LOT more realistic)

Facilities as a factor in recruiting (weight room, academic support, etc.)

The ability to appeal to the AD for stadium or facilities enhancements

Legacy recruits (little brothers, or sons of ex-players)

.........

Personally the time management isn't much of an issue for me, I have a system.

First I sort by time allocation and search all the 18's (no girlfriends) to see if any of them have found girlfriends.

Then, I adjust the soph time rankings to reflect normal positional times

then, I ajdust the freshman with special hours for the first year players.

takes about 5-10 minutes usually.

[alterra]

I know it's a pain in the balls but I really want more dynamic scheduling.

I don't have any problem with the time management.

[damnMikeBrown]

I always hated the time management. It was a huge stumbling block on the way to enjoying a season. I'd realise I had to do it...just sit there and look at it, sometimes do it, usually not. I'd not look forward to playing again, because I'd know I'd have to tackle it when I started the career up.

How about templates? You could design perhaps 6 templates or so for each position. (w. GF, w/o GF, and high IQ/med IQ/low IQ). You'd assign a template to a player, then adjust it according to their personal needs, or not, depending on how much of a time sink the player wanted the time scheduling to be. This would help initially, because you wouldn't have to do 40 clicks on each guy to get him set up, and it could carry over from season to season.

[A-Husker-4-Life]

Originally posted by Hijinx

Legacy recruits (little brothers, or sons of ex-players)


This is already in the game... I just recruited a players son this last weekend, his name is Harvey Williams Jr... His dad was a HOF Linebacker for my husker dynasty... I found that you have to wait about 20 years after the player's been added to the HOF but it doesn't always happen...

[Ben E Lou]

Jim:

Time management is handled VERY well by the TCY Helper. The user has about 25-30 choices to make one single time, and it spits out time recommendations for every player based on the user's input. Of course, then these must be entered by hand. If a TCY Helper-type module were added to the game that actually had an "Apply" button that entered all the changes, it would be a VERY painless process. Here are the parameters the user inputs:

PRACTICE TIME
Just one input

STUDY HALL
a multiplier for int. and asp., which spits out a simple number: (Int*mult1)+(Int*mult2). This number can be then divided into ranges, and each range assigned an appropriate amount of study hall time. I know this sounds complicated, but it is really simple. The interface is extremely user friendly, and the default multipliers (1) and default ranges (multiples of 10) work out easily. In other words, a player with int 90 and asp 30 would come in as a 120 using the default settings. Such a player is then recommended to use whatever study hall time the user has specified for 120 (20 for me).

WEIGHT ROOM
Pretty straightforward here. The user puts in a desired weight room time for each position group, with the option to add additional weight room time globally by year.

FILM STUDY
Again, pretty straightforward. The user puts in a desired film study time for each position group, with the option to add additional film study time globally by year. (Basically, that last option lets the player recommend additional weight room time early on, then back off on the weights as the player gets older and approaches/reaches his "ideal" weight.

RELAXATION
Two simple settings here: "players with girlfriends" and "players without girlfriends".


This system takes about 5 minutes to set up the first time, and maybe 8 minutes to enter into TCY. (With the weight/film balance changing every year, I end up having to make changes to nearly every single player on the roster.) If a similar module were added to the game itself, you're talking a one-time setup, and then it would merely be a simple matter of checking on GPA's, etc. each year and either adjusting a small handful of players, or adjusting the global settings a bit for the future.

[Bee]

It's really nice to see Jim back on the board occasionally. It's nice to know that comments being made aren't just going into the void and never getting to the man who can actually decide if they are worthwhile or possible.

Concerning the time management. I like the basic idea that QS put forth with setting things up to have the computer AI make general adjustments to the overall roster based on some type of configuration the gamer inputs (i.e., more study time for 2.5 gpa or less, etc). The gamer can then go in and make specific adjustments if necessary to individuals.

[Axxon]

Originally posted by SkyDog
Jim:

Time management is handled VERY well by the TCY Helper.

Do you have the link to this app handy??

[Ben E Lou]

Originally posted by Axxon
Do you have the link to this app handy?? http://fofutils.webstrikesolutions.com/tcyhelper/

[Axxon]

Originally posted by SkyDog
http://fofutils.webstrikesolutions.com/tcyhelper/

Thanks a bunch.

[dacman]

TCY Helper is an awsome utility -- having an "apply" button for the changes it suggested and actually having that adjust the time settings for my players as Skydog suggests would be simply MAH-valous.

Some suggestions of mine:

--Ability to select the permanent non-conference opponent when I first start the game with a new team (barring any massive scheduling changes).

--More logical home/away series; it's simply annoying to have to play my archrivals at their place 3 years in a row. (Yeah I know it balances out in the long run).

--It's already been mentioned, but I'll say it again, RECRUIT FILTERS! And also, dumber recruits in general (too many brainiacs, IMHO).

--Ability to select recruits on a region, not just a state. It's simply tedious to have to click through all the New England states when I'm looking for a recruit from any of them.

--Some sort of system that allows a few more invited walk-ons. Say maybe 20 players per year max with 16 max on scholie. In short, I think the hard 16 per year limit is a little bit too small as just 1-2 injuries or academic casulties in the same position group and suddenly I have a total scrub game-generated walk-on on the depth chart.

--Speaking of injuries and position groups, maybe a review of injuries? My DT's and DE's are notorious for getting injured -- my CB's almost never do.

[Solecismic]

Thanks, everyone, for your suggestions. A couple of them did make it into version 1.2, which is now available for download.

Version 1.2 is a free update for everyone who owns The College Years.

If you bought the game on CD, there's a download that includes an update utility you can use. It's about a 1.2M download.

If you bought the downloadable eLicensed version of the game, just download the executable (about 4.2M) from the site and run the full installation program. You shouldn't have to do anything with the license itself, as long as it's already licensed properly.

Please make sure you download the right version of the update. Smaller download for the CD version, larger one for the eLicensed version. They won't work with each other.

You can continue old careers after updating, though the scheduling might seem a bit odd given that South Florida and Utah State have changed conferences. Those two teams will continue to play as independents (but will play a schedule based on their new affiliations) until you begin a new career.
Once you've updated, you can't go back to an older version of the game without losing your saved careers.

[sabotai]

Well, I guess it's time I do what the FAQ does and send a letter to Jim to get my reg code. NCAA 2004 and TCY 1.2 in the same week. College football overdose...

[Noop]

Thanks Jim

:)

noop

[tucker342]

Awesome!

Thanks Jim:)

[33sherman]

Woo-hoo!

Thanks Jim.

[Vince]

I'll chime in my thanks as well :)

[Leonidas]

I've been thinking more and more about this and it's become very obvious to me what all the Solecismic games really need. First, I am preaching to the choir, but they gotta get some online play. No more comment needed, it's been hammered time and again.

Next, and this is a must, have the ability to import dynasties from previous additions of the game. I'm going to hit the wall before too long on buying new games that don't support previous work. I have little incentive to buy a whole new game after working on a dynasty I am in love with and don't want to lose. I think Solecismic is really losing sales by not doing this. OOTP understands this and benefit greatly from it. When I first bought these games and got on this forum there were many, many members still using the older versions of FOF, and I bet many of them weren't buying the new games for this very reason.

I may get incentive to buy a new TCY if it has enough new features, but I think I am tapped out on any new FOF games without this ability.

[digamma]

The new time management screen is a welcome feature.

[Hijinx]

Originally posted by A-Husker-4-Life
This is already in the game... I just recruited a players son this last weekend, his name is Harvey Williams Jr... His dad was a HOF Linebacker for my husker dynasty... I found that you have to wait about 20 years after the player's been added to the HOF but it doesn't always happen...

Yea, I had never seen it before but I did notice your thread about the legacy recruit.

nifty, my bad.

[Runtheball]

It would be nice to see the average weight of OL come down a little. I haven't done any research on this, (and I'm sure Jim HAS) but I doubt that the average weight of OL in college is over 300 pounds. I suspect that the weight training setting simply has too much effect on player weight, and should be toned-down a little bit.

I thought the weights were too high, so I did a check of 3 teams at random and found weights that seemed to average about 315-320. Some (and I don't mean just one or two) of these bubbas were over 340 pounds!

Seems like something that could be fixed with a very minor adjustment.

[Swaggs]

A couple things that I would like to see:


New D-I schools emerging as the game progresses. Teams like Marshall, UCF, and UConn are all relatively new to D-I, it would be neat to see new teams come into play at different points in time (like expansion teams did in set years in prior versions of FOF).
I really want to see conference expansion/contraction and extinction. If I play 75 seasons, the landscape of the game will likely change. Adding the emerging teams and the conference changing would be great.
Options to increase the amount of players per team. As SkyDog was saying, most of us have bigger computers now, so if it is possible to have 85 scholarship players and our computers can handle it, adding that option would be nice.


After playing NCAA '04, I really want to get immersed in a TCY universe.

[tucker342]

Swaggs, I agree with all three of those ideas. Especially number one and number two. I think that having new teams join div-1 would be great, but even more important would be teams switching conferences

[Upstate J]

I really think there should be at least coaching salaries added. On school with lower academics, prestige, etc. could offer you, other coaches a lot more money to come to their school.

The amount of money could be configured into the final score/coach (player) rating. Allowing you to score higher points for just improving a bad school that's paying you a ton to do so. Also, if you do poor at a higher paying school, you could get replaced easier.

Just some in-depth ideas.

[Runtheball]

Been playing another season, and some of the things that have always bothered me are coming to mind. Hopefully Jim is reading and will keep a list of things to address in the next version. If you're reading this Jim, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE the game, but there is always room for improvement.

- Why is it that even though I set my starting QB playing time at 2, and we are winning by 31 points, the starting QB takes every snap until the last minute of the 4th quarter? According to the help file, a playtime setting of 1 means the player will sub out "as much as 1/2 of the time". This doesn't seem to be working as intended.

- It would be very cool to be able to make adjustments at half-time. At a minimum, a few roster adjustments and a change of defensive alignments should be allowed.

- The overall number of penalties seems way too high. My team has averaged about 10 penalties per game every season for the last 20 seasons. Many games we have over 13 penalties! Seems too high.

- Overall, it takes too many "clicks" to navigate around the interface. I admit this is a minor problem, but it would be nice if there could be some type of consolidation of some of the game screens, larger windows with more info per window, or heavier reliance on pull-down menus. It'd be nice if we didn't have to close one window before opening another (for example, if we didn't have to close the box scores window before opening the depth chart window).

[Dutch]

Hmmmm.....that reminds me. How about when you're team is winning by 25+ points, an option to pull some of your starters for the younger guys to get experience?

[Runtheball]

A few more things to be addressed in TCY2:

How is it that a RB that has 5 rushes for 28 yards, no TD, no returns and no receptions, gets 3 stokes? How is it that during the same game a guard that has 8 key run blocks, a fumble recovery, and no sacks allowed gets 0 stokes? The logic for awarding stokes seems to need a revision.

Also, if the penalty logic is in any way tied to the player that commits the penalty, then it would be nice to see that player's name & number called out along with the penalty. That way we can do something about the number of penalties that are generated.

All TE have an Avoid Fumbles rating of 0. Doesn't seem to matter, as my TEs don't fumble much.

[rjolley]

The penalties are probably not attached to a player because that's the way the NCAA does it. Stupid rule to me, but what can ya do?

[MylesKnight]

Revamped Tournament/Playoff Brackets

I'd like to see things not pre-determined in terms of which teams get Byes in the 1st Round of the Tournament. The way it is now, the Conference Champions of the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, C-USA, MWC, Pac-10, and SEC get byes each and every year, regardless of their ranking.

The problem is, at least in my Dynasty, the Champions of the Mid-American, WAC, Sun Belt, Solecismic 8, and the Independents have at many times been ranked well ahead of the winner of one of the 8 Conferences listed above that receive 1st Round Byes. For instance, year in and year out, SMU or Rice has won the WAC and finished the Regular Season ranked in the Top 10 of the BCS Standings, while the winner of the Mountain West in any given year has been ranked somewhere in the area of 25-30 or so the majority of the time (although not in the example bracket I have listed below). Why should the MWC Team get the Bye?

I'd like to see the format changed to instead have the seedings go strictly by final Regular Season BCS Rankings (More on this later..)

Here's an example of a typical NCAA Tournament in my Dynasty..

24 Teams that Qualified for Tournament:

- 14 Conference Champions (Including MAC West Champ/MAC Title Game Loser Toledo...
...Only 13 Conferences in Game. See **** Below for explanation)
- 10 At-Large Bids, Chosen by Ranking in Final BCS Regular Season Poll

# Team

1. Florida (SEC Champion)
2. Michigan (Big Ten Champion)
3. Stanford (At-Large)
4. Miami (Big East Champion)
5. Georgia Tech (ACC Champion)
6. Oklahoma (Big 12 Champion)
7. Iowa State (At-Large)
8. Rice (At-Large)
9. Tulane (At-Large)
10. Air Force (MWC Champion)
11. SMU (WAC Champion)
12. Northwestern (At-Large)
13. La.-Lafayette (Sun Belt Champion)
14. Southern Cal (At-Large)
15. Notre Dame (Independents Champion)
16. Penn State (At-Large)
17. UCLA (Pac-10 Champion)
18. East Carolina (At-Large)
19. Navy (At-Large)
20. Pittsburgh (At-Large)
22. Miami of Ohio (MAC Eastern Division & Overall Champion)
31. Toledo (MAC Western Division Champion & Title Game Loser)
49. Memphis (C-USA Champion)
60. Alaska Tech (Last Frontier Champion)
(Note: The At-Large Selections are chosen by using the Final Regular Season BCS Rankings. Pittsburgh, at #20, was the last to get into the field.)


A couple of other issues while I'm at it..

****In regards to the Conferences that have Divisional Play and have a Championship Game, the Big 12, MAC and SEC, it seems to me that for some reason the MAC Divisional Champion that loses the Conference Title Game (in this case #31 Toledo) still receives a Bid to the Tournament for some reason. This isn't the case in the SEC where Alabama (#27 in the BCS Rankings) Won the SEC West but lost the SEC Championship Game to #1 Florida, or in the Big 12 where North Division Champion Missouri (#28 in the BCS Rankings) lost to South Champion Oklahoma in the Title Game. Both of those schools ('Bama and Mizzou) did not receive Tournament Bids while Toledo did.)

...This is obviously some sort of glitch.


Now, as for the Rankings listed above, I could see two scenarios that would work and would be okay with me as far as putting the brackets together using those (BCS) Rankings..

First one, take the Top 8 Ranked Teams in the Final Regular Season BCS Poll and give them Byes into the 2nd Round/Sweet 16 of the Tournament. Slot all of the remaining teams the same way, using their Final BCS Ranking.

or....

If you want to reward Conference Champions with a 1st Round Bye, give the Top 8 Ranked Conference Champions the Byes in Round #1 and then seed all of the remaining teams in order of their Final Regular Season BCS Ranking, regardless of whether they are a Conference Champion or At-Large Bid.

One other thing I've noticed is that it seems as if the Brackets are re-done after each Round of the Tournament for the most part. This doesn't bother me but I would like to see it stay consistent in regards to Final Regular Season BCS Rankings used in order to Re-Seed Teams after each round.


Now, here is how the Brackets actually looked for this particular season's Tournament...


1. Florida (SEC Champion) Florida
Bye Florida

13. La.-Lafayette (Sun Belt Champion) ULL
19. Navy (At-Large)

---------------------------------------- UCLA

14. Southern Cal (At-Large) USC
31. Toledo (MAC West Champion??)
UCLA
17. UCLA (Pac-10 Champion) UCLA
Bye

---------------------------------------- Michigan

2. Michigan (Big Ten Champion) Michigan
Bye Michigan

15. Notre Dame (Independents Champion) ECU
18. East Carolina (At-Large)

---------------------------------------- Michigan

11. SMU (WAC Champion) SMU
20. Pittsburgh (At-Large)
Air Force
10. Air Force (MWC Champion) Air Force
Bye



---------------------------------------- MICHIGAN



4. Miami (Big East Champion) Miami
Bye Miami

7. Iowa State (At-Large) Rice
8. Rice (At-Large)

---------------------------------------- Oklahoma

16. Penn State (At-Large) Penn State
22. Miami of Ohio (MAC Champion)
Oklahoma
6. Oklahoma Oklahoma
Bye

---------------------------------------- Oklahoma

5. Georgia Tech (ACC Champion) Ga. Tech
Bye Ga. Tech

12. Northwestern (At-Large) N'western
60. Alaska Tech (Last Frontier Champ)

---------------------------------------- Stanford

3. Stanford (At-Large) Stanford
9. Tulane (At-Large)

49. Memphis (C-USA Champion) Stanford
Bye Memphis



Now, here are the 6 Champions (including MAC West Champion Toledo, which I explained that glitch earlier) and the 10 At-Large Teams..

3. Stanford (At-Large)
7. Iowa State (At-Large)
8. Rice (At-Large)
9. Tulane (At-Large)
12. Northwestern (At-Large)
14. Southern Cal (At-Large)
16. Penn State (At-Large)
18. East Carolina (At-Large)
19. Navy (At-Large)
20. Pittsburgh (At-Large)

11. SMU (WAC Champion)
13. La.-Lafayette (Sun Belt Champion)
15. Notre Dame (Independents Champion)
22. Miami of Ohio (MAC Overall Champion)
31. Toledo (MAC West Champion)
60. Alaska Tech (Last Frontier Champion)


What seems to end up happening is the Top 4 Rated At-Large Teams at Seeded 1-4 and then Matched Up against one another in Round #1...

3. Stanford (At-Large)
7. Iowa State (At-Large)
8. Rice (At-Large)
9. Tulane (At-Large)

(1. Stanford vs. 4. Tulane, 2. Iowa State vs. 3. Rice)


Then... the 6 remaining At-Large Teams are Rated 1-6 based on their BCS Ranking and Matched Up individually with the 6 Conference Champions (including MAC West Champ Toledo) which are also Rated the same way..

12. Northwestern (At-Large)
14. Southern Cal (At-Large)
16. Penn State (At-Large)
18. East Carolina (At-Large)
19. Navy (At-Large)
20. Pittsburgh (At-Large)

11. SMU (WAC Champion)
13. La.-Lafayette (Sun Belt Champion)
15. Notre Dame (Independents Champion)
22. Miami of Ohio (MAC Overall Champion)
31. Toledo (MAC West Champion)
60. Alaska Tech (Last Frontier Champion)

What ends up happening is the #1 Seeded At-Large Team plays the #6 Seeded Conference Champ, ie, #1 At-Large Northwestern vs. #6 Conference Champ Alaska Tech, the #2 Seeded At-Large plays the #5 Conference Champ, ie, Southern Cal vs. Toledo, and so on and so forth..


As for the 2nd Round on, this is where I need to do a bit more research..


Is anyone still with me? Any thoughts..... Helluva long post. :D

[Ben E Lou]

A little thing that could speed up time management for those of us who like to use the auto-set, but then check it. How 'bout putting the pertinent info on the player's Time Management screen, and have a NEXT PLAYER bar on that screen? As it is now, you have to click out to the main screen, click next player, look at three screens, then click Time Management, check the settings....etc.etc.etc. This process could be sped up a TON by having the NEXT button on that screen, and by having the following data on that screen as well:

Aspiration, Intelligence, GPA, Current Estimate/Future Estimate, Girlfriend?, Happiness, Class

None of these need bars, or details, just the basic data, so it shouldn't take up that much room on the screen. The "Extra Time" section is a lot bigger than it needs to be, so I'd imagine the room can be found to add the extra data there. The titles could be abbreviated so that the data could look like this:

Asp: 78 Int: 90 GPA: 3.23 Cur/Fut: 34/76 Girl: No Hap: 65 Cl: So*

That one simple line of data (or two lines stack if that works better), and if possible a NEXT PLAYER button, would make a HUGE difference in time management.

[WSUCougar]

A few thoughts to add:

> At the end of the recruiting process, I'd like the ability to select which walk-ons I get. As it stands now, I believe it goes down the list by position (QB, RB, FB, etc.) and selects the first guys who were consdering but not offered scholarships. I'd like to have the group in front of me so I can pick and choose.

> I believe someone else mentioned this in another thread, but I'd like a better idea of where my school stands in a recruit's eyes, relative to otehr schools. I'm thinking of the recruiting websites that state a level of interest for each school being considered.

> A more detailed means of splitting playing time would be great, so I can get my players some PT without getting killed.

[dawgfan]

I'm firing up a new dynasty using the 1.2 patch tonight, so maybe a few of these things have been addressed (can't wait to see the new time-management screen); until then, here are the issues I can think of that I'd like to see addressed:

FG/Punt/4th down: The logic currently in place when a team faces 4th down between the opponent’s 25-40 yard line or so is still poor. Too many times the AI decides to go for it on 4th down and long when it should really try a FG or go for a coffin-corner punt.

Punting average: Punting averages are too low in general. Even the top-rated punters barely or rarely crack 40 yards in gross average in TCY.

Stadium renovation: The issue where stadium renovations can lead to a smaller stadium has been fixed, but the logic behind when a stadium renovation will occur is still a little odd. If you sell out your current stadium many years running that should be enough to get a renovation to occur.

Scouts/Assistant coaches: I’d like to see the current system of scouts and coordinators be modified somewhat. Currently the system has an offensive and defensive coordinator who are rated for things like gameplanning, injury avoidance and recovery, congeniality, as well as player development in certain position categories; scouts are rated for their ability in evaluating recruits at certain position categories, and are limited to 1 geographic region. Your own players ratings are filtered through the view of the scout for your geographic region.

What I’d like to see instead is keep the coordinators, remove the position development categories but add scouting for their relevant player positions (i.e. offensive or defensive). The scouts would be replaced by position coaches: QB, RB/FB, WR/TE, OL, K/P, DE/DT, ILB/OLB, CB/S. Each position coach would have a development rating for their position group, a congeniality rating and scouting ratings for all position groups. The position coaches could be assigned to any geographic region prior to the start of the season. Scouting and recruiting (i.e. congeniality) of particular players would be filtered through a combination of the position coach scouting that region and your coordinator. Development of particular position groups would be governed by the position coaches.

Position changing: At the very least, I’d like for there to be a way of previewing a position switch by having your assistants give you an educated guess of how successful the player would be in the suggested new position. As it is right now, it’s a complete crapshoot. The preview can be filtered through a position coach and coordinator’s scouting ability to make the accuracy somewhat fuzzy.

Taking this idea further, add this ability during recruiting as well – for each recruit, carry additional position information that could be previewed during recruiting, so you could get an idea if that good RB might also make a good CB or LB, or whether that big OG might actually work out as a DT.

Recruiting enhancements/changes: In general I think the recruiting engine works quite well in TCY. With that said, there are a few adjustments that could be made to improve the system. A couple of relatively simple things would go a long way toward making this process more streamlined:

1) Allow the user to flag recruits they’re interested in. Currently I have to track this myself using an Excel sheet – I could save a lot of time and grief if I could compile my target list within the game (the ability to print this flagged list would be very handy as well).
2) More sophisticated searches/filtering of the recruiting screens where I can use criteria that currently exists on different screens, like GPA, overall rating, preferences, etc.

One additional idea might be to add a rating for conference prestige and have that be an additional factor for recruits to favor. For example, maybe a kid in Dos Palos, CA is closest geographically to Fresno State, but he’d really prefer to play in the Pac-10 if he could so a team like Washington State or Oregon State might get a boost over the local team in landing him due to conference prestige.

Idolized schools: This needs a little bit of adjustment IMO. I think we’ve all seen the UCLA phenomenon, where the Bruins dominate the state of California and UCLA is almost guaranteed a top-10 recruiting class every season.

Hiring/firing criteria: Here’s where TCY could borrow from NCAA 2004. Give us a general mood bar rating how satisfied the school is with our performance. Maybe do it in the form of e-mail memos. Spell out certain goals the school has for our performance. Have contract lengths, and offer extensions when we meet or exceed goals.

Also, the logic by which other schools offer you a job should be revised – I still think there aren’t enough offers made to the user. If I’ve won 3 of the last 4 championships with Nebraska while boosting their academic ratings to the top-10 in the country, I should have 90% of the rest of the NCAA willing to offer me a job. Perhaps a feature could be added that allowed the user to designate their “dream job”, and the school in question might be more inclined to offer them a position should the need arise.

AI coach hiring/firing logic: In an ideal world the coaching pool wouldn’t be static and AI coaches would have ages and retire eventually, or if really successful leave for the NFL, and bad coaches wouldn’t be rehired. I see too many coaches with lousy records get hired at plum jobs. Better yet, if there were some way to convert good coordinators into head coaches, and position coaches into coordinators, although that may be too ambitious. It’d be nice to see though.

Scholarship limits: The bug regarding scholarship limits and redshirted players should be fixed so that the AI and human-controlled teams are on the same footing (i.e. the computer no longer is limited to 65 while the user can have as many as 72 on scholarship).

Time management: The way that the TCY Helper allows you to set parameters to get time management recommendations for your players is very helpful – if this type of module could be added to TCY and a button to apply those recommendations included, much time could be saved in playing the game that is currently considered a real drag by most. I haven’t started playing the new 1.2 patch yet so if this (or something similar) has been added already please disregard.

Recruiting timeframe: The debate for when recruiting should occur – during the season or after as a separate section – is a hotly contested one. I could go either way on this, although I give a slight preference to the current setup as it much more closely mirrors reality.

JC transfers: It would be a nice touch to add JC transfers to the recruiting pool, giving the user the opportunity between choosing to invest in a more advanced prospect at the cost of only getting them for 2 seasons.

Hiring assistants: The user should be allowed to hire assistants at the start of the game rather than having to go through their whole first season with random choices made by the computer.

Playing time: Currently the playing time settings don’t really work as expected. A setting of ‘9’ should = play virtually the entire game regardless of the situation or score; ‘5’ should = play the average amount as expected per your position; ‘1’ should = split playing time equally with your backup, and give the 3rd stringer some time as well. The way the game currently works it’s impossible to platoon QB’s unless you switch starters every game.

Depth chart/playcalling preferences: It would be very handy to allow the user to save multiple depth chart preferences and playcalling preferences; that way when injuries occur and then players heal up the user can easily restore depth charts to their preferences rather than only having the scout recommendations, and the user can switch between multiple playcalling settings easily without having to re-enter a bunch of numbers.

Walk-ons: It’d be nice if every once in a while a walk-on joined your team that turned out to have very high potential ratings and actually ended-up being a very good player.

Academic importance: This is a core design of Jim’s to play-up the role of academics in TCY. Many of us disagree with this emphasis as it sharply deviates from reality, but Jim seems pretty firm on designing the game with his vision leading the way, which is understandable. So the following suggestions are made with the foreknowledge that this may be an area where Jim won’t budge.

Reduce the importance of the academic portion of the game, or at least refine it. Most college prospects aren’t as brainy as those in TCY are, at least not the upper-level prospects. The role of academic reputation isn’t as large in most recruit’s decisions as it is in TCY either. Instead of worrying whether that low GPA/low test score guy will bring down my school’s reputation, instead perhaps there’s a risk he won’t qualify for your school and you lose him as a recruit to grades and you only sign 15 guys instead of 16.

Solecismic 8: I think this should maybe go away. I see too many instances where teams in this conference turn into top-10 programs. I understand these teams are needed to fill out schedules, but perhaps they should be reduced to the TCY equivalent of NPC’s – they exist in the game for scheduling purposes and rosters are updated every season, but the user can’t coach them, they don’t recruit off the regular pool (and thus don’t bloat a selected state’s pool of prospects) and their reputations remain static – i.e. they become basically 1-AA schools that exist exclusively as schedule-filler.

If I want a challenge as a coach I can just as easily fulfill that desire with real schools in the game – take your pick of Sun Belt schools for example.

Bowl matchups: I know Jim can’t have the actual bowl names in the game as shipped, but it sure would be nice if the affiliations were the same, especially if the BCS championship bowl could be rotated among the top-4 bowls annually. Someone else mentioned a bowl matchup editor – this would be a good option as well.

Scheduling: I understand the headache that must be programming the scheduling logic. If it could be made more dynamic and flexible that would be outstanding. At the very least, is there any way that future schedules could be available for viewing? I hate scheduling home/away series with opponents to find that the following season I have 6 away games because one of a quirk in my conference schedule. I’d love to see a fix for the inconsistent home/away logic for conference opponents.

[Dutch]

Wow, dawgfan, that was an incredible diagnosis for making TCY a great product.

I'm sure you have discovered now that the Time Allocation menu is a lot easier in 1.2. I like it anyway.

Also, I would suggest that for TCY to go from 1.2 to 2.0 that instead of Solecismic 8, I was thinking more conferences be added. But I agree, the biggest headache will most likely be the scheduling of games. But, TCY2 will probably require more conferences to be more than an update.

What I’d like to see instead is keep the coordinators, remove the position development categories but add scouting for their relevant player positions (i.e. offensive or defensive). The scouts would be replaced by position coaches: QB, RB/FB, WR/TE, OL, K/P, DE/DT, ILB/OLB, CB/S.

Agree 100%, what a great idea!

1) Allow the user to flag recruits they’re interested in. Currently I have to track this myself using an Excel sheet – I could save a lot of time and grief if I could compile my target list within the game (the ability to print this flagged list would be very handy as well).
2) More sophisticated searches/filtering of the recruiting screens where I can use criteria that currently exists on different screens, like GPA, overall rating, preferences, etc.

One additional idea might be to add a rating for conference prestige and have that be an additional factor for recruits to favor.

All of these are again, much needed or just good ideas that can or should be easily implemented.

Recruiting timeframe: The debate for when recruiting should occur – during the season or after as a separate section – is a hotly contested one. I could go either way on this, although I give a slight preference to the current setup as it much more closely mirrors reality.

I'm in favor of having the user decide. Afterall, it should be up to the user to have the most fun they can. The code could be made seperately from the time of year and then incorporated as either a pre-season phase or chosen to be done "real time" through-out the season based on user preference.

Playing time: Currently the playing time settings don’t really work as expected. A setting of ‘9’ should = play virtually the entire game regardless of the situation or score; ‘5’ should = play the average amount as expected per your position; ‘1’ should = split playing time equally with your backup, and give the 3rd stringer some time as well. The way the game currently works it’s impossible to platoon QB’s unless you switch starters every game.

I always assumed this was the intended effect of the 1-9. Perhaps limitations in the game engine effected it's effectiveness.

Depth chart/playcalling preferences: It would be very handy to allow the user to save multiple depth chart preferences and playcalling preferences; that way when injuries occur and then players heal up the user can easily restore depth charts to their preferences rather than only having the scout recommendations, and the user can switch between multiple playcalling settings easily without having to re-enter a bunch of numbers.

Without any real way to guage the effectiveness of my offensive lineman, or my defensive lineman against the run (for instance) I like the idea of having the scout recommendations do the dirty work for me. With one big exception. Sometimes there are certain players I want to force to play.....freshman who are needing playing experience for instance. Sometimes I want to be able to lock players into certain positions and then allow the scout to recommend around those locked positions. That would be a wonderful addition.

Say I have a top prospect at RB I want to start but the scout recommendation insists at not playing him (perhaps to help him get his redshirt). Instead of having to go in every week and move the blue chip from the 4th RB to #1, move the #1 down to #2 and the #2 down to #3...I want to "lock" my guy at #1 (or wherever) and then hit the scout recommendation. A simply checkbox should accomplish this.

Superb work, dawgfan! YOU DA DAWG!

[Fido]

What a great thread this has turned out to be. Providing lots of ideas for what I can in the helper...

Start shameless self-promoting

Originally posted by illinifan999
-How about a High-School All-American page

TCY Helper 3.1 does this and all-state (though TCY does All Country itself in 1.2. ONe thing that is weird though is that, whic the all-country list is complete, many of the all-state lists are not.

Originally posted by Noop
Scouting reports - I'd like to know everything about the player I'm trying to sign. Example: Joe Blow runs a 4.4 according to his highschool coach we clocked at times of 4.38, 4.43, 4.44 . Coach Noop I believe Joe can be a very good player on the defensive side of the ball. But I feel he a player who needs the ball in his hands in order to make things happen. Also he made sure to tell me he's a huge Florida State fan

Planning on adding this feature in once I figure out the rest of the recruit data. Won't be as detailed as you want (I don't have a way to get the 40 speeds), but I will be providing buch more than biggest strength and biggest weakness.

Originally posted by Karim
1) There really needs to be an elaborate recruit filter. I spent way too much time with pencil and paper. If I want to list all LBs over 6'0, with a 1000+ SAT, a 75+ athletic prep, a 50+ academic prep, a 3.30 GPA+, with at least 30 tackles in their last year in high school, who live in the northwest, I should be able to do this.

Available (to some extent) in version 3.1. It will be expanded upon greatly in 3.2 to allow for much more filtering, but you can already do height, weight, position, SAT, GPA, State, State and city, and region filtering.

Originally posted by rexallllsc
make the pbp scroll (ootp) or progress (cm) to build tension
Thinking about adding this to my viewer utility, but the big problem is that it can be tedious if there isn't enough variety in what the announcers say.

Originally posted by TUpei
I have to use notepad to keep track of my recuiting and staff records. It would be nice to have a place in the game to make notes on players, recruits, staff, etc.


On the list of things to do for recruiting purposes.


Originally posted by dacman
--Ability to select recruits on a region, not just a state. It's simply tedious to have to click through all the New England states when I'm looking for a recruit from any of them.

Currently handled.

Originally posted by Dawgfan
Recruiting enhancements/changes: In general I think the recruiting engine works quite well in TCY. With that said, there are a few adjustments that could be made to improve the system. A couple of relatively simple things would go a long way toward making this process more streamlined:

1) Allow the user to flag recruits they’re interested in. Currently I have to track this myself using an Excel sheet – I could save a lot of time and grief if I could compile my target list within the game (the ability to print this flagged list would be very handy as well).


Coming in 3.2

[Alf]

Sorry for the threadjack

Fido - Do you a date for 3.2. I resumed playing TCY VC Indiana and the recruiting phase is the one that takes me the more time. Your latest recruit wise option look tremendous.

[Alf]

dola

Some print functions would be greatly appreciated too (actually you can only do it for one screen, can't remember which one though)

[Fido]

Originally posted by Alf
Sorry for the threadjack

Fido - Do you a date for 3.2. I resumed playing TCY VC Indiana and the recruiting phase is the one that takes me the more time. Your latest recruit wise option look tremendous.

When its ready is all I can say. I really want to get the individual attributes (or at least the overall impressions) sorted out before I release it. I got the Selection Criteria in last night, and hopefully will be able to make headway on the attributes tonight.

Originally posted by Alf
Some print functions would be greatly appreciated too (actually you can only do it for one screen, can't remember which one though)

I already have the print functionality in place in the development version (as well as the ability to completely customize what fields are included in the recruit report). Not enough new features to merit a new version yet, but PM me your e-mail and I can send it to you.

[dawgfan]

Great stuff Fido - you've done an incredible job of enhancing TCY with the Helper. I use it a lot already, and it sounds like with 3.2 a lot more of the stuff I track manually currently will be added, making TCY even more enjoyable. Much thanks...

[Alf]

I will wait for 3.2. Seems you are on fast track mode now ;)

[Fido]

Originally posted by Alf
I will wait for 3.2. Seems you are on fast track mode now ;)

Yeah I go through spurts. Might be time to take some time off though and actually play TCY some now though.

There is a new version available (http://fidosutils.shorturl.com/) that adds in a bunch of what I and other people wanted:

Ability to mark recruits. (double click on an entry in the recruits report)
Ability to Add notes for recruits. (double click on an entry in the recruits report)
More filter options (overall rating, contacted, visited, watch-listed, with/without notes)
Display of actual, in-game oevrall rating, as well as Primary and Secondary Selection criteria. Now displays 30 data fields.
Made the recruits view persistant and customizeable. Select the fields to be included in Edit...Configure Recruits View, or drag and drop columns to reorder them.
Added new recruiting class report which shows recruits committed to the selected school.

[dawgfan]

Outstanding stuff Fido - I'll download the latest version tonight and try it out. You've already gone a long way towards making a good game much more enjoyable.

One additional thing I'd like to suggest to Jim: in addition to refining the playing time settings to behave more as expected, how about an additional setting regarding QB's. Have a field similar to tendency to go for it on 4th down, this one for tendency to yank a struggling QB. A setting of 1 and the QB is pulled immediately when he screws up; a setting of 99 and he stays in all game regardless of how bad he plays.

[Buccaneer]

I really do believe that the next game will be TCY2 - there is no other college football text sim on the market. But despite the assertion of a few others, I don't think we have fully fleshed out input, even from this thread. Without a dialog, how can the developer really know what each of these ideas mean? But knowing reality, I'll offer (or re-offer, I think) two of the most important updates for me:

1. Change the algorithm for Visit Costs from regional-based to location-based. Each X,Y coordinate of HS/city is known and the Visit Costs should solely reflect the cost of traveling from X0,Y0 to X1,Y1. This, by itself, will add to the "inner game" of recruiting where we can now better plan our visits more geographically - just like in real life. This solves the absurdity of traveling from Tallahassee to Mobile (in real life, a handful of miles) but costing the same as if we were to go from Tallahassee to El Paso. Perhaps the total amount given each week to Visit Costs would need to be tweaked to assure that we can do about the same amount of visits (which seems right) but with the new distance cost algorithm.

A corrollary to this would be tie more closely the cost of visits for away games - just like in real life. In others words, have the option(?) of using the city of the away game as the origin and base all visit costs from that point (i.e., visit costs in the city of the away game would be close to 0).

For some (like myself), TCY is 95% recruiting and I'm looking ways to enhance this part of the game.

2. For those do not want to micromanage, it has always been suggested that we let the Assistants do the tasks on our behalf and/or hit the Recommend button. However, those do not work too well, thus forcing some gamers to spend more time in areas that are not fun (or give up). Two areas of note. If a gamer wants to take a break from recruiting for a length of time (usually to get to the end of the season), we should feel confident when we let the Assistants take over. But as tests shown, the AI does a horrid job in choosing and offering scholarships to potential recruits. For example, if your team has 4-5 returning QBs (all rated 40 or above), there is no way that the AI should then go out and offer a scholarship to a 30- QB as it did in one of my seasons. I personally have no confidence in the AI to handle recruiting properly but it should not be the case.

The other area is on gameplans and depth charts. I did not look closely (I was afraid to), but I would hope that the AI-set gameplans matches my team's strengths and weaknesses closely. I really doubt it but it should. Same thing for depth chart. Is there still any reason why a 35-41 Sr. should start over a 32-69 So.?

In my view, the AI (Assistants and Recommend) should perform adequately to give the gamer confidence in letting go of certain tasks. With 1.2, it does not. Without that level of confidence, the game could become more work than fun.

[Dutch]

I think one way to help the AI recommend would be to allow us the ability to rate what we think is important.

I could then rate my defensive backs like this

1. Overall Potential
2. Man-2-Man
3. Interceptions
4. Endurance

Just an aid to the AI in the end. The idea of travel costs being set up by total mileage would be interesting to me if Jim could code it. But I think it would be less advantageous if he had to spend too much time retooling visit costs and things like that. The current system isn't so bad to me.

Maybe an easier way would be to add an option to recruit within a specific range of a city.

[Buccaneer]

Good suggestion, Dutch, I think anything we can add as priorities can produce a better AI.

I think the travel cost algorithm can be fairly easy because I have done this at work (simple pythagorating). One of the good things is that all of the variables in the game are there - we already know the distance of any HS/city to every college. He obviously does some recalcs for each visit we make (region-based) so it would be a matter of using the same block of code but substituting in a different equation. I believe.

[primelord]

Originally posted by Buccaneer
I think the travel cost algorithm can be fairly easy because I have done this at work (simple pythagorating). One of the good things is that all of the variables in the game are there - we already know the distance of any HS/city to every college. He obviously does some recalcs for each visit we make (region-based) so it would be a matter of using the same block of code but substituting in a different equation. I believe.

However just the fact that you have programming experience should tell you it is never that easy.

[Ben E Lou]

Bump....just in case...

[WSUCougar]

Is frothing at the mouth in anticipation considered inappropriate conduct?

[Ben E Lou]

Is frothing at the mouth in anticipation considered inappropriate conduct?Well, I wouldn't start frothing yet. I don't know what Jim's next game is going to be. I bumped this thread because I'm guessing that there'll be no more than one more FOF2K4 patch, and then he'll start working on the next game in the next few weeks or so. *IF* it is TCY2, I thought it would be good for the FOFC community to review this thread now and post any further ideas, so that Jim would have good ideas from the get-go. I've noticed in some of the patch issue threads about FOF2K4, that people continue to insist on posting stuff that obviously would be in a new version, not a patch. It would seem that before-the-fact is the better time to throw out those kinds of ideas--the kind that probably require large-scale code reworking or brand new code.

[Gallifrey]

One can only hope that it is TCY2. Now that would be a good day.

[CraigSca]

/looks frantically for a pre-order button/

[bigdawg2003]

We know that if you cut a popular player, overall team happiness declines. But if you cut an unpopular player, shouldn't overall team happiness improve?

[druez]

I hope this is this next game. So my number 1 suggestion is make this game next. TCY is my favorite product that Jim makes.

One neat feature I would like is the ability to assign a scout to go watch one of my recruits highschool games then come back to me with a scouting report based on what he saw.

I would like the PBP to become more radio style so the play develops instead of us just getting the results shown to us. "I want FOF to do that also"

[Wolfpack]

I'll throw in a couple of thoughts.

1) This sort of thing is true of most college games, but especially here. Another revenue stream for the smaller colleges is to get paid chunks of money to play at big-time schools and get pummeled for it. Many times I see big-name schools playing on the road at a smaller one and typically it doesn't happen in real life (Miami offering to come play me at Montana State without a return game, for example). I think there needs to be some kind of money tied to non-conference game scheduling so that the smaller schools have more of an incentive to play road games at the bigger ones (perhaps include a two-for-one option since that seems to be a recent scheduling innovation).

2) Eliminate the permanent non-conference rival except for the nationally recognized ones. I get annoyed at having NC State play Indiana every year when the two game set they played in 2000 and 2001 was about the only time they ever played one another. Very few non-conference games are ever a permanent arrangement. Notre Dame has a half-dozen (Michigan, MSU, USC, BC, Navy, Purdue), but other fixed rivalry games are typically conference affairs. FSU-Florida, UGa-GT, and SC-Clemson are a few others, but I'm hard-pressed to think of that many more non-conference games that are fixed annual rivalries. FSU-Miami and VT-UVa are going to be conference tilts starting in 2004, so there goes two more of them.

3) Recruiting is fine as scheduled (on-going during the season), but to make it even more interesting, have a signing day after the regular season when all the recruits officially sign (typically this is early February). Include some percentage that a recruit may switch his commit to some other school at the last minute. Perhaps this will mean a level of strength a recruit has to his commitment (Strong/Solid/Wavering), so a coach, even after getting the verbal, may have to expend resources to keep the verbal as signing day approaches. As it is, once you've got the commit, you never pay attention to the guy again until he shows up in camp next summer, which is slightly unrealistic. Granted, recruits switching commits is not a frequent occurance, so perhaps restrict any changes to a percentage of those with "Wavering" commits on signing day.

4) As has been noted by others, fully-editable bowl schedule. Perhaps go further and be able to add or subtract bowls since the really bottom-tier bowls are usually unstable financially, but typically, if one folds, another replaces it.

5) Realistic locations for conference title games for the Big XII and SEC. SEC will likely only ever hold the game in Atlanta or perhaps New Orleans, while the Big XII has shown it'll play in KC, Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, etc. Also, now that the ACC is going to 12, they'll likely play in Jax, Orlando, Tampa, or Charlotte (maybe DC or Baltimore, but I've not heard that they're likely to play there). It seems kind of goofy to play the title game in Corpus Christi, Texas or someplace like that. Perhaps that could be a user controlled option (user selects versus random choice).

[Plundun]

I'd like to see recruits that haven't found a position yet but are termed as athletes. Lots of HS players play on both sides of the ball, why not incorporate this. You would still have fixed-position players but around 40% would be termed athletes, even though they would show HS stats from a position. You would then have the physical measures to try and help you find the best position for the recruit or your coordinators(or if this was added your position coaches) would give suggestions as to where they felt the recruit would be best suited.
If an athlete signed with you his position would be assigned before the season starts the same time when you assign the studying time.
These guys would then show up for training camp locked in their given position where they typically would start with lesser current ability than the guys you recruited that already had a position. They would have just as much potential ability, but would need a red-shirt year more than a fixed-position guy.

You could also add it as a recruiting parameter. When visiting you would get the message X really wants to play QB, even though your coordinators feel that WR is where he would excel. You would either oblige him meaning a bigger chance of him joining you but making the player a fixed-position QB when he shows up, or you could decline meaning less chance of you getting him, but you being free to assign him as a WR.

[yabanci]

I played TCY and liked it, but I was mainly interested in it to feed players into the FOF amateur draft. I think there are probably many others who are the same way. Therefore, I would wish for an upgrade in the draft export feature. The last TCY update helped in this regard, but I think it still could be greatly improved.

[Ben E Lou]

Two little things (ideas from FBCB):

1. Limited conference movement is very cool. If you could take an SC8 team up to the next level, it would add another type of challenge/goal to things.

2. Allow "undos" of recruiting actions before the week is over. It speeds things up to be able to put an action on the first X good players you come across, knowing you can go back and undo those actions if you run across another player or two who you want to call or visit. As it stands now, the player has to do all the math before making any decisions.

[Buccaneer]

Hmmmm... how about some kind of "general instructions" that might mesh with handing over these responsibilities to the coaching staff?

Something like "radio buttons" (perish the thought that I suggest sliders) for things like "Extra classroom time for students with poor grades" and "Extra free time for players with girlfriends" and that sort of thing - let me set some sort of overall strategy, and then let me hand over the responsibility to my coaches (with some confidence that they will do okay with it). I guess the list would need to be subtle to make it work - there should be some thought that goes into deciding what to use. Maybe including offsetting options like "Extra strength training" versus "Extra film study" as global options, in this same vein.

Then, perhaps, alow me to go back and edit one player at a time, after my coachign staff has done the general legwork.
I'm thinking this would also be a good idea for FOF as an optional generalized gameplanning screen, don't you think?

As far as TCY2, here was the idea that I emailed Jim a while ago

> 1. Change the algorithm for Visit Costs from regional-based to
> location-based. Each X,Y coordinate of HS/city is known and the Visit
Costs
> should solely reflect the cost of traveling from X0,Y0 to X1,Y1. This, by
> itself, will add to the "inner game" of recruiting where we can now better
> plan our visits more geographically - just like in real life. This solves
> the absurdity of traveling from Tallahassee to Mobile (in real life, a
> handful of miles) but costing the same as if we were to go from
Tallahassee
> to El Paso. Perhaps the total amount given each week to Visit Costs would
> need to be tweaked to assure that we can do about the same amount of
visits
> (which seems right) but with the new distance cost algorithm.
>
> A corrollary to this would be tie more closely the cost of visits for away
> games - just like in real life. In others words, have the option(?) of
using
> the city of the away game as the origin and base all visit costs from that
> point (i.e., visit costs in the city of the away game would be close to
0).
>
> For some (like myself), TCY is 95% recruiting and I'm looking ways to
> enhance this part of the game.

His basic reply was "TCY has been out there for two years. People are used to the region-based recruiting - while it certainly doesn't map perfectly to travel costs (especially in cases where two neighboring states are in different regions), it's a system people can grasp."

I disagree that we can't learn a new system, esp one that makes more sense. He always talks about the time it takes to do new ideas but time has to be spent anyways and I think the area of recruiting is great place to spend time on.

[DukeRulesMAB]

I know this is probably an unpopular opinion, but I echo a request I saw earlier in the thread and would like to see recruiting divorced from the "playing" season. TCY was, for me, more fun than FOF has ever been, but because of the disjointed nature of playing the game (adjust, sim, recruit, adjust, sim, recruit, etc.), I never got more than 6 or 7 years into a career.

It's just hard for me to get immersed in a season when after every game you have to take an extensive break to go recruit.

[yabanci]

one other thing. I would like to see the categories of player ratings in TCY updated to match the ones in FOF2k4.

[Ben E Lou]

Ahhh...one thing on recruiting:

There doesn't seem to be a wide enough delta between the recruiting points that a top-flight team has and the recruiting points of an SC8 team. It just seems that there should be a wider gulf there.

[CraigSca]

Sorry if this has been mentioned elsewhere in the thread, but - please, please, please do not make positions in TCY2 have the granularity of FOF5. If I have to recruit a WLB or RT, I will barf :)

[dawgfan]

Sorry if this has been mentioned elsewhere in the thread, but - please, please, please do not make positions in TCY2 have the granularity of FOF5. If I have to recruit a WLB or RT, I will barf :)

Agreed - if anything, positions in recruiting should be less specific. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I think some recruits should have multiple position possibilities - perhaps have an option for some recruits showing other potential positions and their scouting report for that position as well.

[Klinglerware]

I know that adding the position of "Athlete" to address players who can play multiple positions has been mentioned before. That's a pretty good idea. But how about adding an "Athleticism" rating to a player's rating set? This way you can better tell which players are more likely to adapt to a position change. For example, a QB with a high Athleticism rating would be more likely to do well at WR or S (like in real life). It could be done to keep it in bounds with the old system: i.e., players should only do well in a shift to another position if he fits a relatively ideal size requirement at the new position relative to the old (such as TE to DL). Anyway, if all players had this athletic rating, this would be great for identifying with multiple position potential for all players, for example we could find more players who could adapt to play DL or OL (which is common in real life)...

[Ben E Lou]

Well, this should go without saying, but just to put it out there:

Career Statistics, and ability to view all player cards in universe history like FOF2K4.

[Ben E Lou]

Dola--

But that might be something that you'd want to let the user toggle on and off, in order to save processor time and HD space. We'd be dealing with almost 4 times as many teams as FOF2K4, and a good bit more players because of the universe turning over every five years.

[Ben E Lou]

Use the calpreps.com national rankings (just about every single high school in the country is in there) to determine "athletic preparation" ratings. This could be a toggle for those who don't care ("randomize high school prestiges"). It bugs me to see Top 100 players come from high schools that have stunk in football for more than a decade, and to rarely/never see recruits from the big-time high school programs because they're randomized with every gamestart.

[Ben E Lou]

Looking at the most recent recruiting classes of a few top-tier teams, it appears that this could stand a tweak...


Georgia's class....

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=765 border=0><TBODY><TR vAlign=top><TD width=10></TD><TD width=580 height=650>
Recruiting

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg3><TD align=middle><TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg1 align=|left|left|left|left||left><TD>Name (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/GA?&_1:col_1=1)</TD><TD>Pos (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/GA?&_1:col_1=2)</TD><TD>Ht (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/GA?&_1:col_1=3)</TD><TD>Wt (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/GA?&_1:col_1=4)</TD><TD>Home State (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/GA?&_1:col_1=5)</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Blake Barnes</TD><TD align=left>QB</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>218</TD><TD align=left>Mississippi</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>A.J. Bryant</TD><TD align=left>QB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>185</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Danny Ware</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>210</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Kenneth Harris</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>196</TD><TD align=left>North Carolina</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Antonio Sims</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'0"</TD><TD align=left>177</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Ramarcus Brown</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>5'11"</TD><TD align=left>162</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Kelin Johnson</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>180</TD><TD align=left>Florida </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Demiko Goodman</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>180</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brannan Southerland</TD><TD align=left>FB</TD><TD align=left>6'0"</TD><TD align=left>210</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jeremy Lomax</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>203</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Seth Watts</TD><TD align=left>OG</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>300</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Charles Johnson</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>237</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Chester Adams</TD><TD align=left>OT</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>317</TD><TD align=left>Alabama </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Thomas Brown</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>5'8"</TD><TD align=left>177</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brandon Lang</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>205</TD><TD align=left>Georgia </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Michael Grant</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>5'10"</TD><TD align=left>189</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Josh Johnson</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>225</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Dannell Ellerbe</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>196</TD><TD align=left>North Carolina</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jamar Bryant</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>195</TD><TD align=left>North Carolina</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brandon Miller</TD><TD align=left>ATH</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>225</TD><TD align=left>Georgia</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

LSU's class:
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg1 align=|left|left|left|left||left><TD>Name (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/LSU?&_1:col_1=1)</TD><TD>Pos (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/LSU?&_1:col_1=2)</TD><TD>Ht (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/LSU?&_1:col_1=3)</TD><TD>Wt (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/LSU?&_1:col_1=4)</TD><TD>Home State (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/LSU?&_1:col_1=5)</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Charles Alexander</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>266</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Harry Coleman</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>205</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Early Doucet</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>207</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Marlon Favorite</TD><TD align=left>DT</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>310</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jacob Hester</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>6'0"</TD><TD align=left>240</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brett Helms</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>300</TD><TD align=left>Arkansas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Lavelle Hawkins</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>5'11"</TD><TD align=left>165</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Chevis Jackson</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>180</TD><TD align=left>Alabama</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Herman Johnson</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'8"</TD><TD align=left>350</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Ryan Miller</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'6"</TD><TD align=left>310</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Luke Sanders</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>219</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Craig Steltz</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>200</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Mario Stevenson</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>195</TD><TD align=left>Mississippi</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Matt Stoltz</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>230</TD><TD align=left>Arkansas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Claude Wroten</TD><TD align=left>DT</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>315</TD><TD align=left>Mississippi</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>P.J. Zimmerman</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>220</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Tim Washington</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>240</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Herman Johnson</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'6"</TD><TD align=left>360</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Tyson Jackson</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'7"</TD><TD align=left>270</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Tremaine Johnson</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>258</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jeffery Jack</TD><TD align=left>CB</TD><TD align=left>5'10"</TD><TD align=left>171</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Curtis Taylor</TD><TD align=left>S</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>185</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Mit Cole</TD><TD align=left>TE</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>245</TD><TD align=left>Mississippi</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Xavier Carter</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>195</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Quinn Johnson</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>225</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Glenn Dorsey</TD><TD align=left>DT</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>285</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Max Holmes</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>275</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Luke Sanders</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>227</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jeremy Jones</TD><TD align=left>TE</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>280</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>E.J. Kuale</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>225</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Ali Highsmith</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>225</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>



Oklahoma:
<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg3><TD align=middle><TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg1 align=|left|left|left|left||left><TD>Name (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OK?&_1:col_1=1)</TD><TD>Pos (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OK?&_1:col_1=2)</TD><TD>Ht (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OK?&_1:col_1=3)</TD><TD>Wt (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OK?&_1:col_1=4)</TD><TD>Home State (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OK?&_1:col_1=5)</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Chijioke Onyenegecha</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>205</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Adrian Peterson</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>210</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Remi Ayodele</TD><TD align=left>DT</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>280</TD><TD align=left>Oklahoma</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brandon Braxton</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'7"</TD><TD align=left>300</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Marcus Walker</TD><TD align=left>CB</TD><TD align=left>5'11"</TD><TD align=left>185</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Lendy Holmes</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>180</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Quentin Chaney</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'6"</TD><TD align=left>203</TD><TD align=left>Oklahoma</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Chris Patterson</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>220</TD><TD align=left>Illinois</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Alan Davis</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>240</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Rhett Bomar</TD><TD align=left>QB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>195</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Garrett Hartley</TD><TD align=left>K</TD><TD align=left>5'9"</TD><TD align=left>176</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Fred Strong</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>190</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Randy McAdams</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'7"</TD><TD align=left>300</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Corey Bennett</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>257</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brett Bowers</TD><TD align=left>S</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>186</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>James Quinn</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>275</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>D.J. Wolfe</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>6'0"</TD><TD align=left>195</TD><TD align=left>Oklahoma</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Cameron Schacht</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>275</TD><TD align=left>Texas</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>



USC:

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
<TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg1 align=|left|left|left|left||left><TD>Name (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/USC?&_1:col_1=1)</TD><TD>Pos (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/USC?&_1:col_1=2)</TD><TD>Ht (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/USC?&_1:col_1=3)</TD><TD>Wt (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/USC?&_1:col_1=4)</TD><TD>Home State (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/USC?&_1:col_1=5)</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jeff Byers</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>280</TD><TD align=left>Colorado </TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Rocky Hinds</TD><TD align=left>QB</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>215</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Eugene Germany</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>248</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Dwayne Jarrett</TD><TD align=left>ATH</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>205</TD><TD align=left>New Jersey</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Fred Davis</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>210</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Thomas Herring</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'6"</TD><TD align=left>292</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Taitusi Lutui</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>370</TD><TD align=left>Utah</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jimmy Miller</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>240</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Josh Pinkard</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>200</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Ryan Powdrell</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>250</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Chilo Rachal</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'6"</TD><TD align=left>310</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Keith Rivers</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>215</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jeff Schweiger Jr.</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>245</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Michael Stuart</TD><TD align=left>ATH</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>220</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Dale Thompson</TD><TD align=left>TE</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>240</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Scott Ware</TD><TD align=left>DB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>220</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Alatini Malu</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>310</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Derrick Jones</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>180</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Lawrence Miles</TD><TD align=left>DL</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>270</TD><TD align=left>California</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Travis Draper</TD><TD align=left>OT</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>265</TD><TD align=left>California

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>


Ohio State:

<TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=2 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR class=bg1 align=|left|left|left|left||left><TD>Name (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OHST?&_1:col_1=1)</TD><TD>Pos (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OHST?&_1:col_1=2)</TD><TD>Ht (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OHST?&_1:col_1=3)</TD><TD>Wt (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OHST?&_1:col_1=4)</TD><TD>Home State (http://cbs.sportsline.com/collegefootball/teams/recruiting/OHST?&_1:col_1=5)</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Devon Lyons</TD><TD align=left>S</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>205</TD><TD align=left>Pennsylvania</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Curtis Terry</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>205</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Dennis Kennedy</TD><TD align=left>CB</TD><TD align=left>5'11"</TD><TD align=left>180</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Albert Dukes</TD><TD align=left>WR</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>184</TD><TD align=left>Florida</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Nader Abdallah</TD><TD align=left>DT</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>300</TD><TD align=left>Louisiana</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Kyle Mitchum</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>265</TD><TD align=left>Pennsylvania</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Nick Patterson</TD><TD align=left>S</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>200</TD><TD align=left>Missouri</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Vernon Gholston</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'3"</TD><TD align=left>235</TD><TD align=left>Michigan</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Alex Barrow</TD><TD align=left>DE</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>245</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Ted Ginn</TD><TD align=left>CB</TD><TD align=left>6'1"</TD><TD align=left>165</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Rory Nicol</TD><TD align=left>TE</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>250</TD><TD align=left>Pennsylvania</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Brandon Smith</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>235</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Dionte' Johnson</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>5'11"</TD><TD align=left>235</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Marcus Freeman</TD><TD align=left>LB</TD><TD align=left>6'2"</TD><TD align=left>232</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Erik Haw</TD><TD align=left>RB</TD><TD align=left>5'11"</TD><TD align=left>210</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Jon Skinner</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>285</TD><TD align=left>Pennsylvania</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Steve Rehring</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'8"</TD><TD align=left>320</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Sirjo Welch</TD><TD align=left>S</TD><TD align=left>6'0"</TD><TD align=left>185</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Chad Hoobler</TD><TD align=left>TE</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>220</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Ben Person</TD><TD align=left>OL</TD><TD align=left>6'4"</TD><TD align=left>295</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Shaun Lane</TD><TD align=left>CB</TD><TD align=left>5'10"</TD><TD align=left>170</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR><TR class=bg2 vAlign=center align=right height=17><TD align=left>Todd Boeckman</TD><TD align=left>QB</TD><TD align=left>6'5"</TD><TD align=left>235</TD><TD align=left>Ohio</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

It appears that even the top-tier programs are signing players primarily from quite close to home, with only a small handful of "national" recruits. These five national powers only signed a total of 19 players who weren't either in-state or from a bordering state--and only 9 who weren't from the same general region of the country.

[Buccaneer]

I would still go with my major suggestion of re-doing the Visit Costs algorithm in making it $/mile from where you are recruiting currently to where you want to go instead of the illogical regional-based visit costs. That way, when Georgia went to Mississippi to recruit Barnes, it would not have cost much more to then hop over to Louisiana and then into the fertile grounds of Texas. It makes much more sense to have it cost far less to go from Biloxi to New Orleans (if I got my regions right) than from Biloxi to Raleigh (in the game, it does not). That would encourage more national recruits as in real life (like John Carroll taking a week-long recruiting trip to Florida and Georgia).

[CraigSca]

I would love to see the polls updated. I think NCAA 200X does it best, as the moves up and down are very realistic. At the beginning of a TCY season, teams tend to jump around too much.

Also, I'd love to see a little window showing Top 25 scores as well as a list of Top 25 performances last week and their upcoming schedule.

Leave the sim engine alone - it's perfect - well, almost. Just add window dressing to the game, and few new features and fix a few non-engine problems and he'd have my $35 same day.

TCY continues to be the game of choice for me. Having to deal with salary caps (and the inevitable 8-8 seasons that come from it) and the fact that great players are signed for cheap one year contracts in FOF have soured me on it.

[bhlloy]

A few random thoughts that may have been already covered:

Academics: Agree that it needs to be toned down a lot, need to cut the number of 3.50+ GPA guys and the number of top recruits that will choose based solely on academics (will choose a Sol 8 program over a top 10 program) This makes it way too easy to build a top program through academics only.
One possible solution: take out the study hall time management (or at least tone it down as in FBCB) Is it really realistic that a coach can force a player to spend x hours of their own time studying, and even if it is, is it realistic that it should have such a huge effect on his grades? A guy with an 800 SAT score should never be able to get a 3.7 GPA even if I put him in the "study hall" for 40 hours a week. What is more realistic is he will duck out of it and become resentful and unhappy and his grades won't change much.

Academic Suspensions: Need to have a bigger part in the game. There should be a real problem with me recruiting a guy with a low SAT score, instead of currently having maybe one player suspended a year. Plus there should be an option as in FBCB for a player I have recruited not to qualify.

Recruiting: Has to be some way to ensure that bigger schools do a better job, too many top 100 players rely solely on distance or academics and this leads to them going to smaller schools. To follow on from SkyDogs post above, it seems schools don't do a good enough job of recruiting out of state or area (or maybe they just can't get those players to come to them) Would like to see idolised school's stay in as they are realistic, but maybe not as the be all, end all. Somebody who grew up watching Miami of Ohio might still consider a full scholarship from Ohio State for it's obvious benefits. And it would be nice if an entire state didn't seem to idolise one team in some cases.

Positions: Need to be much more scope for changing positions, especially just after recruitment or in a redshirt year. Why can't a 280 pound lineman make the shift to D-tackle in his first training camp, especially as I assume he played both ways in high school? His red bars maybe should take a hit but his potential skills shouldn't as at this point his skill set should be all raw skills (strength, mobility etc...) and not position specific. Not sure if I explained that like I wanted. After a couple of seasons, the recruit has learned to be a college lineman and it should be harder to change his position.

Training Camp: Needs to be in. A huge part of real life that isn't modelled in the game at all. I like how players improve in season, but needs to be toned down and have a large part of player development in the offseason. Can then add more options for me to control the development of my players instead of the generic "weight training" and "football study". If I want that DE to concentrate on bulking up and improving as a force against the run, I should be able to instead of having no control over what kind of player he becomes. This ties in with the point above, as maybe position changes can only be done in training camp.


I'm sure I have more but that's all I can think of for now. I'd like to add that TCY is by far my favourite sports sim and it's even outlasted CM and FBCB as the only game I am still playing

[Ben E Lou]

Bump for Daddy Torgo...

[druez]

I would like a radio style pbp. Where the play devlops as the action is going on. Right now the results are displayed with no buildup. I would rather see something like, the QB hikes the ball and drops back....
Flushed out of the pocket...
Evades a tackler and throws deep to the WR (insert names instead of positions)
CB brakes on the ball and bats it to the ground....

2nd and 10

you get the point.

Oh and can I get some sound in the PBP :)

[Ben E Lou]

I would like a radio style pbp. Where the play devlops as the action is going on. Right now the results are displayed with no buildup. I would rather see something like, the QB hikes the ball and drops back....
Flushed out of the pocket...
Evades a tackler and throws deep to the WR (insert names instead of positions)
CB brakes on the ball and bats it to the ground....

2nd and 10

you get the point.

Oh and can I get some sound in the PBP :)There's play-by-play in TCY??? :confused:

[druez]

Some of us like PBP skydog :) Especially if it was done in a more dynamic way.

[Ben E Lou]

Some of us like PBP skydog :) Especially if it was done in a more dynamic way.I know. It was an honest question, though. The game has been out for so long, and since it is a feature that I would never use anyway other than when fooling around with the demo, I honestly wasn't sure if it was even in there.

[Cringer]

i want it by next week..........other then that every thing else has been said pretty much

[Ben E Lou]

Just so everyone knows, this thread is now linked in the reference sticky, as is a thread for FOF6.

[Ben E Lou]

Sticky...

[Honolulu Blue]

I covered my suggestions in another thread (http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/~fof/forums/showthread.php?t=26468&highlight=TCY), but I'll copy my response here for convenience:

I enjoyed TCY for awhile, but three things turned me off from it:

1) The lack of difference in resources between the smallest and largest schools made it too easy, IMO, for the small schools to maintain and/or progress in the rankings.
2) There were too many relatively smart recruits and too many recruits that chose schools for their academic benefits.
3) The concept of time allocation as implemented in the game is, IMO, unrealistic, and the allocation screen is an abomination.

If Jim were to fix those things, I would be first in line to buy TCY2. I'm not holding my breath.

The addition of features from past and current versions of FOF would help others more than me - e.g., playcalling, multiplayer, addtional ratings, more complex game planning.

[Ben E Lou]

OK. This has been up for a week now. I'm unstickying it. To find this in the future, check the top of the reference thread.

[Ben E Lou]

I don't recall reading this in this thread, but how about the option for a post-Bowl, two-to-eight team playoff structure. I find myself almost exclusively using the Bowl system, due to the realism, but as I've thought about it, I'd really enjoy having playoffs after the Bowls.

[CraigSca]

I'd like a little pre-season write-up on the teams...nothing fancy.

Something like:

Last years Offensive YPG: 378.6
Offensive Starters Returning: 8
Key Returnees: QB Joe Blough (2889 passing yards, 14 TDs, 3 Int)

and the same for defense...

Would lend itself to some preseason hype as well as a level set going into each successive year.

[Ben E Lou]

I'd like a little pre-season write-up on the teams...nothing fancy.

Something like:

Last years Offensive YPG: 378.6
Offensive Starters Returning: 8
Key Returnees: QB Joe Blough (2889 passing yards, 14 TDs, 3 Int)

and the same for defense...

Would lend itself to some preseason hype as well as a level set going into each successive year.Drool...

Further in that vein, a preseason conference predicted order of finish...

[Ben E Lou]

Seemed like a logical time to bump this thread and remind everyone that you can get to it from the top of the reference thread. Since we now know that there are several months of coding left before this, or another game comes out, the time is now to give good front-end input on ideas for big changes/upgrades.

[dawgfan]

I know I've already posted a lengthy suggestion list, but after firing it up again recently as well as doing a lot of sim-only with NCAA 2005, I'm finding a lot of things that I think Jim could improve on in a TCY2. One thing I'd like to see as an over-arching theme to revising TCY would be to make it even more of a coaching RPG. Some ideas:

Coaching
Overall, I'd like to see this area revised to be more like an RPG. What I mean by this is logical movement, head coaches aging similar to their assistants (and with the resulting effects on their ability ratings), retirements, some coaches leaving for 'professional' football, a shift in the staff from just the offensive and defensive coordinators and a bunch of regional scouts to a true coaching staff, with job progression a possibility (QB coach moving up to OC, OC moving on to another school as HC, etc).

Coaching staff - I'd like to see the current system of the staff consisting of an OC, DC and 8 regional scouts revised; change the scouts into assistant coaches - one each for QB's, RB's, WR/TE's, OL, DL, LB's, Secondary (CB & S) and Special Teams (including K & P).

Every assistant has ratings for each of the position groups, which indicate their areas of expertise - maybe some guys are just QB gurus and don't know squat about any other area, maybe some guys are more generalized and can effectively coach a number of different position groups. This rating would affect how well they can develop players in that position group. This would also be affected by length of time they've been coaching that group - if you're in your first season at a new position group, you take, say, a 50% penalty on your coaching effectiveness, which would go away to no penalty after say 3 or 4 years, and a gradual bonus to your ability for each year after that (this would promote/reward staff stability).

Each coach would also need to be manually assigned to one of the 8 recruiting regions. Every assistant would also have a "congeniality" rating which would reflect their recruiting ability and influence positively or negatively your ability to sign prospects from their region. Similar to the position group time bonus, the longer a particular assistant is assigned to a region, the more effective they are as a recruiter (reflecting real-life networking that happens between local H.S. coaches and the college assistant coaches that recruit that area). This would also limit users from just swapping their best recruiters every season to different regions based on prospect lists.

The coordinators would have similar ratings to the assistants, as well as their play-calling and injury avoidence ratings. Scouting would consist of a combination of the assistant assigned to that position group, the assistant assigned to that recruiting region, and the coordinator's rating for that position group all combining to determine how accurate an assessment is made for each position group in each region.

I think that defensive coordinators should have a formation specialty just like offensive coordinators do - I don't think you should be able to swap between base 4-3 and 3-4 easily.

Assistants could be promoted to coordinator positions, with some rating assigned that gave an indication of their play-calling and injury avoidence ratings.

Likewise, coordinators would also have a projected rating for their ability to handle head coaching responsibilities like team discipline, academic performance, sportsmanship, etc.

Coach Movement - As currently implemented in TCY, this function doesn't make a lot of sense in many cases. The firing logic could use some tweaking (and I'll address that more later) but even more bizarre is some of the hiring choices the AI makes - high-rep teams with a history of success hiring guys with awful coaching records and not terribly great ratings. By adopting the changes suggested above, you'd see assistants promoted to coordinators and coordinators getting jobs as head coaches and vice versa. Rather than being limited to a stagnant list of recycled coaches, there could be a constantly evolving pool of candidates to choose from, with some dropping out of the pool by retirement or leaving for the pros, and new ones working their way up the ladder from assistant to coordinator to head coach.

Hiring/Firing criteria - Here's an area where Jim should borrow liberally from NCAA 2005 - give the user some idea of what the expectations are of the school that hires you, and a running rating of how satisfied they are of your job performance. Perhaps add in elements like e-mails from the AD congratulating you when you're doing well and talking about contract extensions, and warnings when you're doing poorly and the boosters are getting antsy. There's nothing worse in TCY than taking over a program in need of major rebuilding, doing what you think is a pretty good job of turning the program around and then suddenly getting fired at the start of the next season with no prior warning. This pissed me off so much in my last career that I'm done with TCY - I can't justify spending the hours I do playing it only to be dumped with no explanation or clear-cut justification.


Recruiting
In general I think the recruiting engine works quite well. I'm neutral on the timing issue - I'm fine with it happening during the season, but I can see the argument of moving it to the off-season (kind of like the seperate free agency period in FOF). I'm also neutral on the travel budget setup - unlike Bucc, I can live with the current quirks of how travel budget is calculated, as it makes for some interesting strategic choices.

What I'd like to see improved is more customizable filtering options. The way the TCY Helper handles this is a great example of what I'm looking for - I can filter based on position group, overall rating, GPA, test score, region, state, height, weight, etc. I love the TCY Helper, but it'd be nice if this level of functionality were built into TCY itself.

If we really wanted to get sophisticated, Jim could make it possible to sign more than your alloted number of scholarships to account for possible academic casualties, and potentially forcing the user to try and convince some of the recruits to "greyshirt" (delay enrollment to the next recruiting period) to fit under the max yearly limit, with some agreeing and some deciding to become recruitable prospects again and going back into the pool for next year.


Academics
Like most, I'd prefer to see the academic side of TCY more reflect reality, though I understand that this is an intentional design decision by Jim, and the 1.3 patch has toned down academic importance slightly. I think this could be further modified though. Right now, every prospect in TCY gets in to school regardless of their GPA or test scores - you just have to either assign them more time in Study Hall (and taking away from their Film Study and Weight Training time, slowing down their development, or lowering their Free Time and making them unhappy) or risk they'll fail a class and be ineligible and likely to leave school after their academic suspension.

I think it would be more interesting if guys with questionable grades and/or test scores were risks to not gain entry into college. Tone down the academic importance overall, but to compensate provide a greater risk to recruiting guys with questionable academics. Even more cool would be if the database kept these non-qualifiers in the mix and then had them resurface later as JC transfers eligible to be recruited again.


Game Engine
I've hammered on this in the past, and it's still my biggest gripe - the 4th down logic for teams between their opponents' 25-40 yard lines is horrible. Teams consistently go for it on 4th and long when they should punt or kick a long field goal. There is very little evidence of teams trying to play the field position battle and attempt coffin-corner punts. The punting logic probably needs greater sophistication to reflect directional punting ability as differentiated from leg strength, and hopefully this would fix the punting averages which are about 5-10 yards too short on average (when was the last time you saw a punter in TCY finish with a 40+ yard average?)

Maybe more than just the slider on how frequently to go for it on 4th down, it could be broken down to willingness to attempt long field goals (based on your kicker's ability), willingness to coffin-corner punt (based on your punter's directional punting ability) and willingness to go for it on 4th down.


Position Switching
I think positions in TCY are way too structured - it should be a lot easier to convert a G to a C for example, or a TE to a FB or a DE. NCAA 2005 does a very good job of allowing position switching and doing a pretty realistic job of reflecting bonuses or penalties to overall ratings based on the switches. I don't think TCY should make these ratings changes explicit like NCAA 2005, but there should be some kind of indication of how successful a position switch would be before doing so.

I also like the "athlete" designation in NCAA 2005 and how that's handled. Perhaps recruiting in TCY could reflect possible position switch info in the database. It makes more sense to me for example to recruit 'offensive linemen' with each guy having a particular specialty (C, G, T), but not making it a major deal for most players to move them to another spot on the line, and with some of them equally rated as OL or DT/NT. Same thing with some WR/DB.


Early NFL Entries
This is probably too toned down in TCY. I like the way NCAA 2005 handles it, with a logical number of guys declaring early and the ability to try and "recruit" them to return (and coming out of your recruiting budget).
__________________________________________

As I think of more things, I'll edit. I'm sure I addressed some other issues in my previous post(s) in the thread - I'll go find them and try to consolidate my thoughts.

[Ben E Lou]

Interface change like FOF2K4: Make box scores/logs accessible team-by-team, rather than all on one page.

[Ben E Lou]

Ah. And add the option to save box scores/logs from all games involving schools in your conference.

[Klinglerware]

One pet peeve I've had with TCY are allocated (i.e., unrecruited) walk-ons who happen to have a national ranking (usually kickers)--for some reason their ratings are just as crappy as any other allocated walk on. I think that any unrecruited walk-on that appeared in the previous season's recruiting pool should have the same rating as he would have had if he were actually recruited...

[Ben E Lou]

An AI improvement needed: better adjustments to personnel with regard to primary offense. LSU had FOUR TE's rated 60 or higher (current), and only 2 WR's rated above 35, yet ran the run and shoot. I'd like to have seen them fire their coordinator for one who actually used an offense with at least one TE involved, or just switch offenses. Their coordinator wasn't that good to justify this.

[jbmagic]

An AI improvement needed: better adjustments to personnel with regard to primary offense. LSU had FOUR TE's rated 60 or higher (current), and only 2 WR's rated above 35, yet ran the run and shoot. I'd like to have seen them fire their coordinator for one who actually used an offense with at least one TE involved, or just switch offenses. Their coordinator wasn't that good to justify this.


off topic

is that the case with FOF 5.1b too?

[mhass]

I am just getting back in to TCY after playing the first version and then letting it sit for FOF. One thing that bugged me back then and still gets on my nerves is the different recruiting views. A dream would be to make one view user-definable so I could pick which columns I want. For instance, I use the Scout rating and Distance from the Worksheet view, but want GPA and Nat'l rank from a couple others.

On the positive side, the time management shortcut in this version is incredible. For a guy who hated that tediousness, this is alone is worth the second purchase.

[tdydynasty]

I like to more realistic idolization. Have people idolize you program all around the country if you are Air Force, Army, Navy and to an extent Notre Dame. If you have a program that has been down for 10 years it would be nice to have a nice group of top players idolize your school. Who in the State of California idolize Nevada and Arizona State? Not many if any but I see it almost every year. Recruits on the border idolize out-of-state schools often. Examples, Arkansas (Oklahoma!, Missouri), Michigan (Ohio!!), Rutgers (New York, Pennsylvania). In general, schools with a lot of distance between them or state-border schools generally have more idolized people then schools that are close together. UCLA (very rarely USC) generally has all the idolized people in Southern California except for the majors they don't offer (sometimes they have every major). I want a option for idolization.
Here would be my settings:
1-like it is now
2-completely random(all over the country) For example:A person from Texas could idolize Hawaii
3-based on prestige level
4-based on past history

Also, I want to see 2nd generations when I start instead then 30 years after. I want more of them generally.

[CraigSca]

I'd like to see scouting simplified. Rather than the constant "oops, gotta replace my southwestern scout because he got another job", just have your level of scouting tied to the amount of $$$ you apply from your budget. The bigger schools with more $$$ will obviously have a much bigger scouting budget than the smaller schools. It will also take a lot of the drudgery that I personally see in the game from having to micromanage your scouting network.

[TazFTW]

I would like to see a fully editable Bowl schedule. Have an option of adding or deleting bowl games on a season by season basis. Have the option of selecting who get into the bowl games i.e. drop box that you can select SEC #4, etc... Bowl games with ties to schools. Maybe this is just for the Sheraton Hawaii bowl but they have a clause that states if Hawaii becomes bowl eligible then they get an automatic invite.

I'd like to see American Samoa become a place you can recruit from.

You have idolized schools, how about idolized coaches?

JC transfers

A screen that shows who transferred from where to where.

Full scholarship limit. 60 man road rosters. More sanctions.

[Klinglerware]

I'd like to see American Samoa become a place you can recruit from.



- And Canada...

- Also have the recruit pool be larger in states that have strong pools in real life.

- A final end-of-season recruit screen (associated with the new TCY Today poll) that shows where else your signed players were visiting besides your school.

- The 46 defense option actually being a 4-3 with lots of blitzing and man to man, rather than a 4-4

[Ben E Lou]

I'd love to see a "team history" screen option that gives a little more info. Something these lines:

<table width="1136"> <col span="2" style="width: 48pt;" width="64"> <col style="width: 152pt;" width="202"> <col style="width: 123pt;" width="164"> <col style="width: 112pt;" width="149"> <col span="3" style="width: 48pt;" width="64"> <col style="width: 68pt;" width="91"> <tbody><tr style="height: 22.5pt;" height="30"> <td colspan="3" class="xl28" style="height: 22.5pt;" align="center" height="30" width="265">
</td> <td class="xl30" align="center" width="175">
</td> <td class="xl30" align="center" width="153">
</td> <td class="xl30" align="center" width="89">
</td> <td class="xl30" align="center" width="87">
</td> <td class="xl30" align="center" width="156">
</td> <td class="xl31" align="center" width="182">
</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 12.75pt;" height="17"> <td class="xl32" style="height: 12.75pt;" align="center" height="17" width="1">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="65">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="236">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="175">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="153">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="89">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="87">
</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="156">
</td> <td class="xl33" align="center" width="182">
</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 18.75pt;" height="25"> <td class="xl34" style="height: 18.75pt;" align="center" height="25" width="1">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="65">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="236">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="175">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="153">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="89">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="87">
</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="156">
</td> <td class="xl35" align="center" width="182">
</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 18.75pt;" height="25"> <td class="xl36" style="height: 18.75pt;" x:num="" u1:num="" align="center" height="25" width="1">
</td> <td class="xl40" align="center" width="65">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="236">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="175">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="153">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="89">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="87">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="156">
</td> <td class="xl37" align="center" width="182">
</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 12.75pt;" height="17"> <td class="xl36" style="height: 12.75pt;" x:num="" u1:num="" align="center" height="17" width="1">
</td> <td class="xl40" align="center" width="65">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="236">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="175">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="153">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="89">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="87">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="156">
</td> <td class="xl37" align="center" width="182">
</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 18.75pt;" height="25"> <td class="xl36" style="height: 18.75pt;" x:num="" align="center" height="25" width="1">
</td> <td class="xl40" align="center" width="65">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="236">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="175">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="153">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="89">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="87">
</td> <td class="xl26" align="center" width="156">
</td> <td class="xl37" align="center" width="182">
</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 12.75pt;" height="17"> <td class="xl32" style="height: 12.75pt;" align="center" height="17" width="1"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="65"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="236"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="175"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="153"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="89"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="87"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="156"> </td> <td class="xl33" align="center" width="182"> </td> </tr> <tr style="height: 22.5pt;" height="30"> <td colspan="3" class="xl38" style="height: 22.5pt;" align="center" height="30" width="265">ALABAMA</td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="175"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="153"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="89"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="87"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="156"> </td> <td class="xl33" align="center" width="182"> </td> </tr> <tr style="height: 12.75pt;" height="17"> <td class="xl32" style="height: 12.75pt;" align="center" height="17" width="1"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="65"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="236"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="175"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="153"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="89"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="87"> </td> <td class="xl24" align="center" width="156"> </td> <td class="xl33" align="center" width="182"> </td> </tr> <tr style="height: 12.75pt;" height="17"> <td class="xl34" style="height: 12.75pt;" align="center" height="17" width="1">YR</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="65">RECORD</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="236">PASSING</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="175">RUSHING</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="153">RECEIVING</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="89">TACKLES</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="87">SACKS</td> <td class="xl25" align="center" width="156">INTS</td> <td class="xl35" align="center" width="182">FINISH</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 18.75pt;" height="25"> <td class="xl36" style="height: 18.75pt;" x:num="" u1:num="" align="center" height="25" width="1">2004</td> <td class="xl41" align="center" width="65">9-3</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="236">A. Gaylor 181/309, 2623yds, 21TD, 11INT</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="175">B. DeMeester 131x772yds, 11TD</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="153">A. Barton 39x717, 8TD</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="89">D. Bradshaw 61</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="87">J. Fulcher 8.5</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="156">K. Davison 4</td> <td class="xl43" align="center" width="182">won Seattle Bowl</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 18.75pt;" height="25"> <td class="xl36" style="height: 18.75pt;" x:num="" u1:num="" align="center" height="25" width="1">2005</td> <td class="xl41" align="center" width="65">10-3</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="236">A. Gaylor 145/235, 2171yds, 23TD, 9INT</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="175">P. Jankowski 172x903yds, 8TD</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="153">C. Bellas 45x786, 10TD</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="89">T. Caldwell 58</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="87">S. Knaack 7.5</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="156">B. Liwienski 4</td> <td class="xl43" align="center" width="182">won SECCG, won Orange Bowl</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 19.5pt;" height="26"> <td class="xl39" style="height: 19.5pt;" x:num="" u1:num="" align="center" height="26" width="1">2006</td> <td class="xl44" align="center" width="65">10-3</td> <td class="xl45" align="center" width="236">D. Daniels 201/364, 3278yds, 33TD, 12 INT</td> <td class="xl45" align="center" width="175">B. Burns 113x635yds, 8TD</td> <td class="xl45" align="center" width="153">C. Bellas 69x1108, 12TD</td> <td class="xl45" align="center" width="89">J. Walker 71</td> <td class="xl45" align="center" width="87">O. Flannery 17</td> <td class="xl45" align="center" width="156">B. Liwienski & D. Caldwell: 5</td> <td class="xl46" align="center" width="182">lost SECCG, won Gator Bowl</td> </tr> <tr style="height: 18.75pt;" height="25"> <td class="xl36" style="height: 18.75pt;" x:num="" align="center" height="25" width="1">2007</td> <td class="xl47" align="center" width="65">11-2</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="236">K. Durham 198/339, 634yds,29TD,14INT</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="175">B. Burns 97x547yds,5TD</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="153">B. Woods 61x988,12TD</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="89">R. Dakota 63</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="87">O. Flannery 21</td> <td class="xl42" align="center" width="156">B. Liwienski 6</td> <td class="xl43" align="center" width="182">won SECCG, won Rose Bowl</td> </tr> </tbody> </table>

[WSUCougar]

Good idea, SD. I'd go a step farther with that concept and do the same thing for conferences. I realize that this info can be pulled from the record section, but an "at a glance" leader board like you've shown would be cool.

[Dunleavy]

Would love to see a TCY2 period, much over due.

-PT should be just as important to recruit as Acad, TP, Dis

-besides the big 4 reason for recruits (Acad, TP, PT, and Dis) coaches should be important

-programs should get reputations for great success at a position.
--i.e. over a 8-10 year period if you have a heisman winner or multiple All-Americans, conference POY at one position players should recognize that
--also players should recognize your coaches system (i.e. WR's like a run and gun coach)

-for TP, should be weighted conference rankings so a MAC, WAC, or Sol8 team can't be up in the 90's like Mich, ND, FSU etc...

-keep the regions, but forget the scouts. instead get recruiting coordinator for each region
--they would recruit and scout. RC would be same as scout but in addition have Congeniality/recruiting ability

-Keep Coordinators: for play call, position development, injury avoid, rehab.
--should share a role in recruiting (about 1/3, 2/3 for RC)

-increase the accuracy of RC/scout for our own teams alittle bit (30%) for all positions

-would be great to have the recruits ranking list of schools recruiting him
--somewhat unrealistic, could instead have his interest level in schools, High, Med, or Low

-should be a pipeline of sorts, you should have a loose relationships w/HS coaches in a school district you have recruited from before


-when a recruit decides, add some drama. don't just give just a name and answer
--having a "guess the attendance" like game would be too much to ask, but should allow the recruits profile to open for review, then click a button for decision

-players should make visits even with out an offer from you, and after should send you an email about how they liked it (or didn't)

-Acad ratings should be pre-set by the school itself, but move up to 5 points it either direction based on players grades

-i'd like to see rosters expanded

-i dont like having a fixed out of conference opponent (well, i like the idea just didnt like my schools opponent. Illinois vs Cal?)

-players should develop a little better, plus i often have players that have great Soph year and #'s wise the have big dropoffs the next two years

-i rarely have a player go pro, sad to say, but this should happen more often

-i dont need to call every play like FOF, but in game adjustments would be nice.
--"run more" "pass more" button. change D, change players, kick a FG etc..

-the polls could use some corrections, i play playoff and the guys in championship games are not all ways #1 or #2, even after winning
--if the polls were better you could have the useless info of how many weeks teams have been in Top 25, 10, and #1

-the stokes could be way cooler then they are, now they are weighted way too much to RB and QB. stokes could go into record books too

-HOF players should have all years stats plus awards

-i've had a practice of 24, and still 12 pentalies a game

-should be more media hype, maybe 3 fake experts to make all the picks (pre-season, mid-season)

-coaching blocks should be used for one thing, i.e. getting grades up, adding weight, increase happiness etc...

-would like to change the playoff system, everyone has their on take on how to do it but for me take the top 8 teams for the playoff
--rest of bowl eligible teams play in bowl games. options within the playoff option would be nice


let me second some other good idea's..

-liked the idea of a spring practice with stats and/or coaches thoughts
-JUCO's mixed right in w/HS'ers
-like the idea of Hesiman watch (maybe even conference POY watch too) and preseason media picks, not just players but also your conference standings too
-like the idea of the game keeping a recruiting log for each player
-loved the idea of a recruting filter for a region not just states
-love to see a team history like the one posted by skydog




tried to get everything but i'm sure i missed something, hope 05 is the year for TCY2!

[WSUCougar]

There's some excellent ideas in there, Dunleavy. Nice post and welcome to the board.

[Dunleavy]

thanks. love the game and recently came back to it, although it's kicking my behind

[Noop]

Dunleavy you have some great ideas man. However I feel like you should show these to Greydog's programmer Arlie(sp?) they seem more willing to add such features into the game. And over time will improve the ideas... Not a slam against Jim but the word hard headed comes to mind when I think of his games.

[Ben E Lou]

Bumping this and FOF6, due to Jim's recent comments. Keep the ideas coming, guys.

[st.cronin]

TCY is my favorite game of all time. A sequel would probably doom my relationship with my significant other.

[A-Husker-4-Life]

Finally, TCY2......... Plz Jim..... We all have been waiting for years....

[Ben E Lou]

Finally, TCY2......... Plz Jim..... We all have been waiting for years....



http://www.fof-ihof.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/icon_fap.gif (javascript:emoticon(':fap:')) http://www.fof-ihof.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/icon_fap.gif (javascript:emoticon(':fap:')) http://www.fof-ihof.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/icon_fap.gif (javascript:emoticon(':fap:')) <-------AH4L on the day Jim announces TCY2

[kingnebwsu]

Been forever since I saw this thread, but I'll post some thoughts. How about something like conference strength/rankings? We can already sort the rankings by conference and scroll through to get a general idea of how good they are, but a page listing conference rankings would rock hardcore.

I'm sure this has been said, but how about being able to sort through possible new staff members. That'd save me a lot of time. Maybe be able to assign a point value to each category (0 for lousy, 1 for the next, etc.) and search for people by their total point values. Something like that.

Something I'd love is to be able to switch between the playoff and bowl systems mid-career. This may be a logistical nightmare, but to me I'd greatly appreciate it. I wanted it on bowls to start out, but now I'd like to switch to playoffs (just to see what it's like). No way I give up my 50+ year universe to start over :)

On a similar note, I'd love to be able to transfer my current TCY career into TCY 2. I'd bet dollars to donuts this won't happen, but if Jim added this, I may drive to NH to buy him a drink ;) Even if it wasn't everything, just some of the basic stuff like HOF'ers and previous rankings and standings and...oh. I guess there's a lot of basic stuff :p

How about offensive and defensive players of the week for each conference? That'd be cool.

Please tweak the Coach of the Year process. Tony Kosters of UCLA has won 34 of the 61 COTY's in my dynasty.

Is conference movement a possibility? FBCB does an amazing job with this. Bump up one team that's tearing it up and demote a crappy crap crap team.

With coach movement, I'd love to be able to be proactive and let a school know I'm interested in their opening. Just maybe a sitdown or something to increase the likelihood they'll look at me. Ohio State went through many coaches before hiring me away from the SCE team and their 12 titles. No way they'd let an in-state school show them up for over 50 years. They'd have stolen me away ;)

That's some of the things I can think of right now. Here's to hoping August brings a new TCY game (that's compatible with the first one!!!) :)

[WSUCougar]

Bumping this and FOF6, due to Jim's recent comments. Keep the ideas coming, guys.
Did I miss something? Which recent comments? :confused:

[Eaglesfan27]

Jim posted this in a thread about Baseball sims not getting young player development right:

<TABLE class=tborder id=post751595 cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=4 width="100%" align=center border=0><TBODY><TR><TD class=thead> #20 (http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/showpost.php?p=751595&postcount=20) http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/images/styles/yellow/buttons//report.gif (http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/report.php?p=751595)
<!-- status icon and date -->http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/images/styles/yellow/statusicon/post_old.gif Yesterday, 04:36 PM <!-- / status icon and date -->
</TD></TR><TR><TD class=alt2 style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px"><!-- user info --><TABLE cellSpacing=4 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD noWrap>Solecismic (http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/member.php?u=352) http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/images/styles/yellow/statusicon/user_offline.gif<SCRIPT type=text/javascript> vbmenu_register("postmenu_751595", true); </SCRIPT>
Solecismic Software
</TD><TD width="100%"> </TD><TD vAlign=top noWrap>Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: Amherst, NH
Posts: 972


</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><!-- / user info --></TD></TR><TR><TD class=alt1><!-- message, attachments, sig --><!-- message -->One major reason I don't announce new projects very far in advance is because I'm working on a lot of things.

That said, the bar is very, very high in baseball - these games are far prettier than I could ever hope to create without a team. I don't have the financial ability to hire a dedicated artist, though I feel confident that my engine design is very different from anything on the market. Maybe someday. Not this year.
<!-- / message --></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

[A-Husker-4-Life]

http://www.fof-ihof.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/icon_fap.gif (javascript:emoticon(':fap:')) http://www.fof-ihof.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/icon_fap.gif (javascript:emoticon(':fap:')) http://www.fof-ihof.com/phpBB2/images/smiles/icon_fap.gif (javascript:emoticon(':fap:')) <-------AH4L on the day Jim announces TCY2

Lol.... I'm going to have take work off that day :D

[Ben E Lou]

Put this together thinking about what a "real" calendar year looks like for running a college football program with the announcement of Grey Dog's game. Wanted to post it here too, as I don't particularly care who does this, I'd just like to see it.


I'd like to see a realistic calendar. I *love* the way FBCB moves seamlessly from one month to the next, with logical actions for each month of the calendar year. I'm writing this in April 2005, and in real life, recruiting has been going on pretty much since the first Thursday in February. Kids are being recruited NOW for next February's signing day. Junior days have already happened at several (if not all) SEC schools. *Tons* of recruits are heading to the G-Day game in Athens this weekend, and a bunch were there watching practice last weekend. Texas already has 16 verbals. Most top-tier teams will have 16-20 verbals by the time the season starts. The December-February period may have a few blue-chippers left in it, but most of the big schools will have their classes 70-90% full by then. For big schools, Dec-Feb. is spent mainly making sure all those verbals don't de-commit, and then focusing on the small handful of target guys left. I like the FBCB model of having a continuous calendar, especially for college football:

January 2005: finish Bowl (or playoff) section, mop-up recruiting for 2005 Signing Day if you're at an elite school, heavy recruiting for 2005 signing day if you're a non-BCS D-1 school like a Tulane, a Memphis, a Miami of Ohio.

February 2005: Signing day! Some verbals change their tune on you. News of which underclassmen decide to declare for the NFL Draft.

March 2005: Hold Junior Days for 2006 recruits, visits to high schools, first verbal commitments for Class of 2006.

April 2005: spring practice (work on new formations, some particularly smart incoming signees already enrolled in school and can practice, getting a boost in development, chance of injuries if you decide to have a spring game, but if you DO have one, can increase alumni donations and loyalty, as well as be a showcase game where Class of '06 HS players check out your school, players who were injured in the season and can't practice, like Kregg Lumpkin, get minimal/no boost in development, )

May 2005: visits to high school spring practices to evaluate players (can't tell you how many recruiters I saw at Tucker's spring practice last year....probably 6 or 8 different D1 schools every day), find out if any of your returning players will be academically ineligible for 2005 season.

June 2005: summer training for current players and incoming freshmen, host summer camps for high schools (would give a BIG boost to attendees in both propensity to sign with you and in accurate evaluation of talent)

July 2005: new weight room, 40 times, etc. recorded for returning players and new players. (UGA usually does this the last week of July.), more summer camps to woo/evaluate 2006 recruits

August 2005: Practice! Players can potentially get injured, (see Kregg Lumpkin again...out for the year in '04 in a non-contact drill), potential for "breakout" players at this point (guys who perform well in practice unexpectedly), first "accurate" evaluation of football skills of incoming freshmen

September-December 2005: play games, host official visits, call players, go to high school games anywhere on off weeks (within budget), go to high school games within x number of miles of your location on game weeks...going to high school games increases likelihood of coming to your school, and gives you a more accurate picture of the player

[WSUCougar]

Good stuff, Ben. Thanks for posting it.

[Buccaneer]

When it comes down to it, I would love to see a college football game that looks and plays like FBCB.

[Ben E Lou]

When it comes down to it, I would love to see a college football game that looks and plays like FBCB.That's basically what I'm trying to say. The flow and one-more-turn feel of that game is incredible.

[Buccaneer]

That's basically what I'm trying to say. The flow and one-more-turn feel of that game is incredible.
Best one-more-turn feel of any sports game in history, imo.

I am keying on your thought of "something to do each month". Recruiting definitely belongs in the off-season and gameplay purposes, I would strongly prefer to have most of it out of the way before the season begins - with some follow-up for campus/game visits during the season. I know that's taking too much out of the season but FBCB proves that it keeps the game (and the gamer) flowing.

[WSUCougar]

As much as I love TCY (and FBCB), one thing that both seriously lack to me is any life in the recruiting feedback. TCY offers a little, but in the end doesn't much sense of the recruit's sentiments. You hear the initial message, crunch the Academic, Prestige, and Distance figures, and are then left scratching your head when the guy signs with some other school that seemingly shouldn't be in the mix. FBCB offers you a top five list and a Very High, High, Average, Low, Very Low scale, but it's still rather dry.

[Ben E Lou]

FBCB offers you a top five list and a Very High, High, Average, Low, Very Low scale, but it's still rather dry.But in real life, that's really basically all the information that's out there. I subscribe to Rivals.com, and they list a player's scholly offers, his "interest level" (High, Medium and Low), and a Top Five. Quite often, the FBCB model is about as detailed as a college coaching staff knows in real life. Don't forget that we *are* dealing with the whims of 17 and 18 year old kids here. Having witnessed this process firsthand more than a few times now, I can tell you that many times even a player's high school coach, his parents, and the player himself couldn't tell you more than a Top 5. I think a combination of the "idolizes" thing in TCY, the VH/H/A/L/VL list of FBCB, and the Top Five List of both games is about as accurate as it should get in this area.

[cartman]

I'm just wondering how much more overhead it takes to do recruiting for college football versus basketball. You have 300+ teams in basketball with 12 to 15 players a team, and 3 to 6 players recruited each year. In football, there are 115+ teams, with 60 to 80 players on each team, and 10 to 25 players recruited each year. So I the pool of recruits is going to be much higher for football, or so it would seem.

[cartman]

But in real life, that's really basically all the information that's out there. I subscribe to Rivals.com, and they list a player's scholly offers, his "interest level" (High, Medium and Low), and a Top Five. Quite often, the FBCB model is about as detailed as a college coaching staff knows in real life. Don't forget that we *are* dealing with the whims of 17 and 18 year old kids here. Having witnessed this process firsthand more than a few times now, I can tell you that many times even a player's high school coach, his parents, and the player himself couldn't tell you more than a Top 5. I think a combination of the "idolizes" thing in TCY, the VH/H/A/L/VL list of FBCB, and the Top Five List of both games is about as accurate as it should get in this area.

Prime example: Ryan Perrilioux. Was a solid Longhorn until the final weekend, when he switched to LSU. If this happened in a game, we'd probably call it a bug... :)

[WSUCougar]

No, Ben, I agree with you in that sense. What I mean is that visits or phone calls are mere allocations, rather than tangible gauges of the recruit's intentions. In TCY, "Joe Smith thanks you for contacting him again." Until the massive visit haul of Week 8, most of the recruits are simply "considering" you and you're basing a lot on speculation that too often is a shot in the dark. In reality of course there is a huge amount of speculation and guesswork, but the coach/recruiter also has the advantage of personal contact with the recruit to gauge things. If in TCY I have all the numbers in my favor and am being considered, yet all I hear from my latest call is, "Joe Smith is seriously considering Vanderbilt," should that be enough?

[WSUCougar]

Prime example: Ryan Perrilioux. Was a solid Longhorn until the final weekend, when he switched to LSU. If this happened in a game, we'd probably call it a bug... :)
True...but I'd want my ideal college football sim to explain the scenario to me somehow, so I'd understand that it WASN'T a bug.

"Ryan decided that, when it came right down to it, he knew that he'd never win a championship under Mack Brown." :D

[sovereignstar]

If in TCY I have all the numbers in my favor and am being considered, yet all I hear from my latest call is, "Joe Smith is seriously considering Vanderbilt," should that be enough?

That tells me, *let Joe Smith go to Vanderbilt*
;)

[Eaglesfan27]

Put this together thinking about what a "real" calendar year looks like for running a college football program with the announcement of Grey Dog's game. Wanted to post it here too, as I don't particularly care who does this, I'd just like to see it.


I'd like to see a realistic calendar. I *love* the way FBCB moves seamlessly from one month to the next, with logical actions for each month of the calendar year. I'm writing this in April 2005, and in real life, recruiting has been going on pretty much since the first Thursday in February. Kids are being recruited NOW for next February's signing day. Junior days have already happened at several (if not all) SEC schools. *Tons* of recruits are heading to the G-Day game in Athens this weekend, and a bunch were there watching practice last weekend. Texas already has 16 verbals. Most top-tier teams will have 16-20 verbals by the time the season starts. The December-February period may have a few blue-chippers left in it, but most of the big schools will have their classes 70-90% full by then. For big schools, Dec-Feb. is spent mainly making sure all those verbals don't de-commit, and then focusing on the small handful of target guys left. I like the FBCB model of having a continuous calendar, especially for college football:

January 2005: finish Bowl (or playoff) section, mop-up recruiting for 2005 Signing Day if you're at an elite school, heavy recruiting for 2005 signing day if you're a non-BCS D-1 school like a Tulane, a Memphis, a Miami of Ohio.

February 2005: Signing day! Some verbals change their tune on you. News of which underclassmen decide to declare for the NFL Draft.

March 2005: Hold Junior Days for 2006 recruits, visits to high schools, first verbal commitments for Class of 2006.

April 2005: spring practice (work on new formations, some particularly smart incoming signees already enrolled in school and can practice, getting a boost in development, chance of injuries if you decide to have a spring game, but if you DO have one, can increase alumni donations and loyalty, as well as be a showcase game where Class of '06 HS players check out your school, players who were injured in the season and can't practice, like Kregg Lumpkin, get minimal/no boost in development, )

May 2005: visits to high school spring practices to evaluate players (can't tell you how many recruiters I saw at Tucker's spring practice last year....probably 6 or 8 different D1 schools every day), find out if any of your returning players will be academically ineligible for 2005 season.

June 2005: summer training for current players and incoming freshmen, host summer camps for high schools (would give a BIG boost to attendees in both propensity to sign with you and in accurate evaluation of talent)

July 2005: new weight room, 40 times, etc. recorded for returning players and new players. (UGA usually does this the last week of July.), more summer camps to woo/evaluate 2006 recruits

August 2005: Practice! Players can potentially get injured, (see Kregg Lumpkin again...out for the year in '04 in a non-contact drill), potential for "breakout" players at this point (guys who perform well in practice unexpectedly), first "accurate" evaluation of football skills of incoming freshmen

September-December 2005: play games, host official visits, call players, go to high school games anywhere on off weeks (within budget), go to high school games within x number of miles of your location on game weeks...going to high school games increases likelihood of coming to your school, and gives you a more accurate picture of the player

Just wanted to echo those who really like this post. I'd really like to see these sort of things implemented in ANY college football game.

[timmynausea]

Count me among the people that think the game, primarily recruiting, should be going all year just like real college football. Spring practice and/or fall camp like SkyDog described would be cool, too.

[cartman]

True...but I'd want my ideal college football sim to explain the scenario to me somehow, so I'd understand that it WASN'T a bug.

"Ryan decided that, when it came right down to it, he knew that he'd never win a championship under Mack Brown." :D

I actually prefer this one: "This recruit wants immediate playing time, and is a bit concerned about the entrenched starter, a pre-season Heisman candidate"

:D

[Ben E Lou]

Don't recall seeing this in this thread, but I haven't read the whole thing in a while, so forgive me if it has already been mentioned, but it it this: it makes no sense for the in-season walk-ons to be absolutely *horrid* academically like they are. I mean, they got into college on their own academic merit, unlike the rest of the guys on the team. :)

[Klinglerware]

Don't recall seeing this in this thread, but I haven't read the whole thing in a while, so forgive me if it has already been mentioned, but it it this: it makes no sense for the in-season walk-ons to be absolutely *horrid* academically like they are. I mean, they got into college on their own academic merit, unlike the rest of the guys on the team. :)

I release those guys until the computer gives me someone that is to my liking academically. I try to do it the moment they get on the roster to minimize the effect dumping them has on happiness scores. Is it gaming the system? Maybe. Am I the head coach? Yup.

[Ben E Lou]

I've been doing some looking around at college rosters, and examining recruiting trends, and I'm convinced of something else that needs to change in TCY: too many recruits are going to far-away schools. My guess is that Prestige and Academics are valued too highly, and Distance too lowly. I've got a few anecdotal details in this post (http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/showpost.php?p=779005&postcount=19), as well as a couple of other posts in that thread, but in general, I've discovered that in real life even the elite teams get the huge majority of their players from in-state or nearby states. National Champion Southern Cal's roster shows only 16 of their 90 players coming from outside of California or Arizona. I'm looking at a TCY career at the beginning of 2013. 100-Prestige Florida has 38 of 81 players coming from outside of the Southeast. 99-Prestige Texas only has 28 of 83 players coming from Texas. In real life, only 12 of the 100+ players listed on the Longhorn roster come from outside of Texas--and several of those are from Louisiana and Oklahoma. There's not a single real-life Longhorn from the Northeast, or even the upper midwest or Great Lakes, yet the TCY Longhorns feature 20+ players from up that way. I could go on and on, but the bottom line is this: *far* fewer players go far away from home than is modeled in TCY. My suspicion is that there are a couple of things that need to change:

1. A higher percentage of the quality prospects need to come from the Big Five recruiting hotbed states. (California, Texas, Florida, Georgia and Ohio)--Schools in or nearby those states in particular should have enough players to fill 80-90% of their rosters with quality players. There's a reason why most of the top teams these days are from in or near the five states mentioned. Heck, even Utah had over half of the players on their roster from in-state. The vast majority of the out-of-staters (as in 70-80%)? California. I don't have the inkling to look up all of their 30-40 players from Cali, but I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of their California natives were 2-to-3-star prospects who didn't get offers from strong in-state schools.

2. Distance from home needs to be a *much* more important factor than it currently is. In the thread mentioned above, for example, I looked at Maryland's current current recruiting class, heralded as one of their best ever. The fact is that 18 of the 24 players signed are from close enough that mom and dad can drive to the game in the morning, and drive home that night. Of the six players not from nearby, all six are from the aforementioned "hotbed states": 4 from Florida, 1 from Georgia, 1 from California. Here's where it gets interesting, though. None of those six players got a significant offer from a solid in-state school. Three of the four Florida guys had offers from UCF, but nothing from Miami/Florida/FSU. The other three got no in-state offers whatsoever. I follow recruiting pretty closely, and I can assure you that this pattern is in no way unusual or unique. The inference is clear: the vast majority of kids who go far away from home do so not because they want to, but because they have to. Sure, a kid from Florida will pick the much-more-prestigious Maryland over UCF, but it is actually pretty rare in real life that a kid from Georgia would pick Maryland over, say, South Carolina, or that a non-elite prospect from New Jersey would ever get an offer from Texas. (Over half of the northeastern players on the TCY Texas squad were not even in the Top 30 players in the country for their position.)

[Klinglerware]

I've been doing some looking around at college rosters, and examining recruiting trends, and I'm convinced of something else that needs to change in TCY: too many recruits are going to far-away schools. My guess is that Prestige and Academics are valued too highly, and Distance too lowly. I've got a few anecdotal details in this post (http://dynamic2.gamespy.com/%7Efof/forums/showpost.php?p=779005&postcount=19), as well as a couple of other posts in that thread, but in general, I've discovered that in real life even the elite teams get the huge majority of their players from in-state or nearby states. National Champion Southern Cal's roster shows only 16 of their 90 players coming from outside of California or Arizona. I'm looking at a TCY career at the beginning of 2013. 100-Prestige Florida has 38 of 81 players coming from outside of the Southeast. 99-Prestige Texas only has 28 of 83 players coming from Texas. In real life, only 12 of the 100+ players listed on the Longhorn roster come from outside of Texas--and several of those are from Louisiana and Oklahoma. There's not a single real-life Longhorn from the Northeast, or even the upper midwest or Great Lakes, yet the TCY Longhorns feature 20+ players from up that way. I could go on and on, but the bottom line is this: *far* fewer players go far away from home than is modeled in TCY. My suspicion is that there are a couple of things that need to change:

1. A higher percentage of the quality prospects need to come from the Big Five recruiting hotbed states. (California, Texas, Florida, Georgia and Ohio)--Schools in or nearby those states in particular should have enough players to fill 80-90% of their rosters with quality players. There's a reason why most of the top teams these days are from in or near the five states mentioned. Heck, even Utah had over half of the players on their roster from in-state. The vast majority of the out-of-staters (as in 70-80%)? California. I don't have the inkling to look up all of their 30-40 players from Cali, but I'd be willing to bet that the vast majority of their California natives were 2-to-3-star prospects who didn't get offers from strong in-state schools.

2. Distance from home needs to be a *much* more important factor than it currently is. In the thread mentioned above, for example, I looked at Maryland's current current recruiting class, heralded as one of their best ever. The fact is that 18 of the 24 players signed are from close enough that mom and dad can drive to the game in the morning, and drive home that night. Of the six players not from nearby, all six are from the aforementioned "hotbed states": 4 from Florida, 1 from Georgia, 1 from California. Here's where it gets interesting, though. None of those six players got a significant offer from a solid in-state school. Three of the four Florida guys had offers from UCF, but nothing from Miami/Florida/FSU. The other three got no in-state offers whatsoever. I follow recruiting pretty closely, and I can assure you that this pattern is in no way unusual or unique. The inference is clear: the vast majority of kids who go far away from home do so not because they want to, but because they have to. Sure, a kid from Florida will pick the much-more-prestigious Maryland over UCF, but it is actually pretty rare in real life that a kid from Georgia would pick Maryland over, say, South Carolina, or that a non-elite prospect from New Jersey would ever get an offer from Texas. (Over half of the northeastern players on the TCY Texas squad were not even in the Top 30 players in the country for their position.)


I definitely agree that the recruiting pool needs to be based more on real-life production by state rather than population by state as it seems now.

I'm not sure what can be done about recruiting locally, since the recruiting universe of TCY is only about 60-70% of real life. Depending on the state, there are not a lot of good div-1 prospects to go around. More importantly, because of the game's skew towards academic success, it actually makes more sense (for the non-elite players) to recruit an academic performer from the other side of the country than an academically weaker in-state guy, which is the opposite of real life.

Perhaps a solution to that would be to balance the academic probation effects with a "homesickness" effect, where out of region players are more susceptible to leaving the program (especially when things don't go right for them). That way, just as you are taking a risk if you recruit a weak academic guy, you are also taking a risk if you recruit a guy from out of region who doesn't have "(distance)" as a preference. And perhaps the homesickness can be alleviated by giving them playing time or a coaching block or two... or something like that.

To get back to the in-state, out-of state: another problem is that elite programs don't have to recruit out of their geographic footprint, but non-elite programs do have to recruit nationally. So while that non-elite prospect from NJ won't get an offer from Texas, he will get offers from MAC and second tier Florida schools. I guess the program tries to balance the differences in recruiting now, but I guess it is just something very difficult to get just right.

Another difficulty arises when there are multiple schools of different prestige tiers in one state. In those cases the opposite (and just as unrealistic) effect is seen: because of the distance effect and the way prestige is accumulated, eventually elite players will, for example, choose a top MAC team (especially if it is local) over the in-state Big 10 school. I'm not sure how that can be tweaked, though...

[Ben E Lou]

I'm not sure what can be done about recruiting locally, since the recruiting universe of TCY is only about 60-70% of real life. Depending on the state, there are not a lot of good div-1 prospects to go around.Well, my first thought on thatis that TCY was given some limitations (rightly, I think) probably due to the limitations of the average user's computer when it came out. I commented on this earlier in this thread--but nearly two years ago: When TCY came out, I was playing it on a P2, 475MHz machine with 128 Megs of RAM. I'm now playing on a P4, 2.4GHz, 512 Meg Ram machine. I wouldn't have wanted my system to handle a larger game back then, but my current system could easily handle a good bit more. I'll bet that is true for a whole lot of folks. Even if TCY2 is Jim's next project and comes out next year, my current 2.4GHz system will be an average-to-low-end setup, and I'd have NO problem running a significantly bigger game on it.Now, nearly two years later, my 2.4GHz/512Meg RAM machine will be upgraded again before Solecismic's next release to something around 3.2Ghz/2Gigs. Recruiting classes in TCY were limited to only 16 players. TCY2 should be able to step it up to have real-life-sized recruiting classes and scholarship limits. It ran just fine on a 475MHz machine four years ago.

More importantly, because of the game's skew towards academic success, it actually makes more sense (for the non-elite players) to recruit an academic performer from the other side of the country than an academically weaker in-state guy, which is the opposite of real life. Absolutely. We'll see what Jim does with this, but it seems that the overwhelming sentiment is to make it truer-to-life, with academics seriously toned down.

To get back to the in-state, out-of state: another problem is that elite programs don't have to recruit out of their geographic footprint, but non-elite programs do have to recruit nationally. So while that non-elite prospect from NJ won't get an offer from Texas, he will get offers from MAC and second tier Florida schools.Agreed, but this also gets back to my thoughts on year-round recruiting. Ball State didn't bother to even begin to recruit Trey Buice, a 1.5ish star player from Tucker, until mid-to-late December. I'm guessing they know what I have just started to figure out: if MTSU or UAB or Troy State (or even Georgia Southern, probably) had offered Trey, he would have gone any of those places before Ball State, so no point in wasting resources on a kid until you get to the point where you know he's not going to get offers from nearby schools.

Another difficulty arises when there are multiple schools of different prestige tiers in one state. In those cases the opposite (and just as unrealistic) effect is seen: because of the distance effect and the way prestige is accumulated, eventually elite players will, for example, chose a top MAC team (especially if it is local) over the in-state Big 10 school. I'm not sure how that can be tweaked, though...That's where generic distance, rather than Regions or States, needs to come into play. Look at the rosters of Auburn, Alabama, Tennessee and Clemson in particular, and you'll see a decent number of players from Georgia and Florida. Those three-star guys from Ga/Fla that don't go to FSU/Miami/Florida/Tech/UGA shouldn't go to UCF; they should then be looking at other schools within driving distance. Maybe the stray 3-star kid from 'way down in Miami should go to UCF or USF sometimes, but a 3-star kid from Tallahassee needs to be looking *much* harder at Auburn or 'Bama than at UCF. It is one thing that concerns me about the "Region" system, actually. I wonder if, because Alabama is not in the same "Region" as Florida, that "Dist" kids from Northern Florida are picking UCF over Auburn or Alabama too often.

[st.cronin]

I like the conference prestige rating factor in FBCB - it could fix some issues I have with TCY.

[judicial clerk]

1. A higher percentage of the quality prospects need to come from the Big Five recruiting hotbed states. (California, Texas, Florida, Georgia and Ohio)

Is Pennsylvania no longer a school boy football hotbed? I know about Penn State's problems, but I always thought Pennsylvania poduced a bunch of players.

It seems out west that everybody gets their players from California.

[Ben E Lou]

Is Pennsylvania no longer a school boy football hotbed? I know about Penn State's problems, but I always thought Pennsylvania poduced a bunch of players.

It seems out west that everybody gets their players from California.PA has dropped off a bit. They used to rank ahead of Georgia and Ohio, but not any more. I'm pretty sure they're still in the Top 10, though.

[Ben E Lou]

Heh. Some clown decided I was wrong about this at the Grey Dog boards, then posted data from the top recruits this past year completely supporting MY assertion (and claimed that "MOST" of the top recruits were national...) The numbers from the top guys of '05???

Stayed In-State: 38
Regional (adjacent and nearby states): 23
National: 15

So half of the guys on HIS list stayed in their home state, yet this guy claims that MOST of them are national. Unbelievable.

http://www.greydogsoftware.com/forum/showthread.php?p=23670&posted=1#post23670

[Ben E Lou]

[Ben E Lou]

Oh yes, and 12 players from the 2006 Rivals 100 have made verbal commitments. How many of those are to in-state schools, you ask?

12.

http://uga.rivals.com/viewrank.asp?ra_key=1100

[Ben E Lou]

Another thought: "play for winner" ratings--not just in terms of recruiting, but in terms of performance. Have guys who come from elite high schools have a higher chance of getting discouraged and not developing as well if they have a 3-8 season, for example. This thought came to me after a conversation this week with a highly-regarded prospect's dad. As he was talking about the unlikely prospect of his son going somewhere without a strong winning tradition, he commented that the kid has no idea what it is like to go 3-8. Tucker is 36-4 since he's been in high school; his middle school team went 6-0, and his dad said his teams rarely lost in youth league football as well. He doesn't think Asher has lost more than 7 or 8 football games in his entire life, and he's not sure how he'd respond to losing that many in a single year. For some guys from winning programs, have them bring in a winning "mindset" if they go to a losing program, but for others, have the losing mindset of his school to really drag him down.

It would be cool to have a couple of 3-star prospects from top-flight high schools go to, say, Memphis, and really make a big difference because they bring a winning attitude with them.

[Ben E Lou]

Oh, and let me spead agreement with those who have mentioned: more feedback. If, for example, a "play for winner" situation was included in the game, it would be nice to receive an e-mail saying, "Your defense is playing over its head this year, and most people credit it to LB Harry Jackson and DT Jared Coleman. Not only are they leaders by example on the field, but they both brought refuse-to-lose attitudes with them from their championship days in high school." or, if FOF2K4-style chemistry is included: "LG Jonas Whitfield is under-performing, and your line coach believes it is because he's distracted by his feud with LT Nathan Simpson."

[mhass]

I would also love to see some more development along the lines of the high school rankings that are included. For instance, if Mendota, IL is #14 in the country, let me double click on it to see the recruits from there, get coach's opinions/advice on his players, etc. If the high school coach says, RB Marvin Wyatt is a bruising runner but can't find a hole without a FB in front of him and I run a single-back formation, I know to stay away.

A high school coach could say "RG Lawrence Filcher is really a pulling, trapping kind of guard. You should check out my LG Henry Cimoli even though he's lower rated. Cimoli is a pure pass blocker for your run-and-shoot style." This can build the high school "ties" or relationships others have mentioned previously that set up the pipelines colleges have today.

I suppose the general recruiting process could divulge the same information, but high school coaches would understand the players better. I might also expand the 'system' aspect in the season as well. e.g., Off. Coord. Davis says that QB Terry Closman is not picking up the wishbone like we hoped. It may be time to try Dishman since he ran the option in high school.

Or, "In a coaches meeting after Saturday's game, TE coach Lawson said that TE Williams has missed a key block for the last time. He's demanding he be benched or the offensive system be adjusted."

[OldGiants]

PA has dropped off a bit. They used to rank ahead of Georgia and Ohio, but not any more. I'm pretty sure they're still in the Top 10, though.
That's my biggest concern with "hard coding" the current big five in college recruiting into TCY--it has changed and will change. I think we all play TCY careers of 10+ years, at a minium. Shouldn't adapting to trends and changes in recruiting be a part of the game, not just "I'll go to the big five states for all my recruiting needs, even if IRL California has had a series of earthquakes and tsunamis and now has a population of 2.5 million?"

Also, it makes for a more enjoyable game for me (and otheres outside the current big five states, I bet) to have good players come from out home states or the states we've decided to use for our TCY careers. The fundamental reason we begin careers at our alma maters is to alter reality, so why worry about a recruiting detail that we all know is going to change in five years?

[Ben E Lou]

That's my biggest concern with "hard coding" the current big five in college recruiting into TCY--it has changed and will change. I think we all play TCY careers of 10+ years, at a minium. Shouldn't adapting to trends and changes in recruiting be a part of the game, not just "I'll go to the big five states for all my recruiting needs, even if IRL California has had a series of earthquakes and tsunamis and now has a population of 2.5 million?"

Also, it makes for a more enjoyable game for me (and otheres outside the current big five states, I bet) to have good players come from out home states or the states we've decided to use for our TCY careers. The fundamental reason we begin careers at our alma maters is to alter reality, so why worry about a recruiting detail that we all know is going to change in five years?Ummmm...it has *barely* changed in the last couple of decades, and maybe longer than that. My guess is that it hasn't changed much at all since integration. PA is no longer in the Top 5, but it is #6. The last list I saw just had PA and GA switching places between number 5 and number 6.

As far as the other argument, that goes waaaaayyyy back to the discussion in 2001 on expectations of TCY. Many people's expectation was that you'd start out in an SC8 school, and the best you'd be able to do would be build it up to the best SC8 school. After 5-10 seasons there, you'd get an offer from a Marshall or a Troy St. You'd build that school up to contending for the conference title every year, and maybe crack the Top 25 every now and then and pull off a major upset once or twice, but you'd still have a ceiling, due to resources, on how high you could go. From Marshall, you might get an offer at an Iowa St or Kentucky: crappy team in a BCS conference. Build them up, maybe win a conference title once in a blue moon, but you still be unable to be a 100-Prestige kind of school unless you stayed there 20+ years. The idea would be for it to be more like FBCB: yeah, you can take Savannah State to the top, but it is gonna take you 40+ years. Right now in TCY, you can take an SC8 team to the Top 10 in a decade or so.

So, yeah, I have no problem with a school outside of the major recruiting centers becoming dominant, but I'd want it to look like real life: it would take at least 15-20 years before you could get kids outside of your sphere of influence to come play for you on a regular basis. Plus, I'm not suggesting that NO good players should come out of the major recruiting centers; they should, and they do. I'm just suggesting that they should be much more rare. It is very annoying to see a perennial bottom feeder produce top prospect after top prospect.

Bottom line: acquiring real-life national data on top high school programs wouldn't be terribly difficult. (Heck, calpreps.com has nearly every single high school in America ranked.) For those that don't want to use it, just like TCY currently has an option to use random prestige and random academics, you add an option to "Randomize High School Prestige" for those that want that to happen.

[Ben E Lou]

More on recruiting...

I just had a long conversation with Minnesota Defensive Coordinator David Lockwood (http://www.gophersports.com/coaches/coach.asp?sport_id=mfball&coach=DavidLockwood). I asked him, without prompting in either direction, two questions: "Where does a college staff spend more time--studying and preparing for the opposition, or recruiting?" and "What's more important to a college program: how well they recruit, or how well they prepare and evaluate?" The answers to both questions were pretty much as I suspected they'd be--*HEAVILY* slanted toward the recruiting side of things. He said one thing that surprised me a bit, and that I'd really like to see integrated into TCY2: they recruit on Friday nights both on home game weekends AND on road game weekends. He said that in most programs, the head coach and the offensive and defensive coordinators meet on Friday nights to go over last minute details of game plans, etc., but that pretty much every assistant fans out to high school games. He said if they're playing at Ohio State, they'll send assistant coaches, scouts and grad assistants out so that they see a dozen or so different games anywhere within a 3 or 4 hour drive of OSU on that night. Because they do this, they spend a significant amount of time during each week not worrying about the opposition's schemes or their own prep, but simply on mapping out who goes where that week. He repeated the same mantra several times as we talked about it: "Game plans and schemes don't matter if you don't have the players. Players are *everything* (his emphasis) in the college game." As far as the offseason, he said that pretty much all he does is recruiting-related, (as was clearly evidenced by the fact that Minnesota's Defensive Coordinator spent nearly 3 hours watching just one team practice all the way down in Georgia today.)

How could this play out in TCY2? Ideas (some of which aren't new, I know...)



Recruiting costs for the week based on location of that week's game.
Recruiting budget much more heavily tied to Prestige--if you're Miami (FL) playing at Texas, you can afford a significantly larger staff to canvass the area near Austin on Friday night than if you're Central Florida playing a Texas.
slight carryover of recruiting points from one season to the next...yeah, Minnesota won't land Asher Allen, but because Lockwoood showed up today, he established a connection with the Tucker coaching staff--a connection that won't just be completely reset to zero next season.
I keep coming back to the thought of a month-to-month calendar. Heck, if people wanted to spread out their in-season recruiting, then have it where in-season recruiting tasks only have to be done once per month. You could just save everything up and use it at the end of the month, (We played twice in Athens this month, once in Lexington, and once in Baton Rouge, so we get 2x worth of recruiting points with Athens as the focal point, x worth of recruiting points with Lexington as the focal point, and x worth of recruiting points with Baton Rouge as the focal point.), or you could do a little bit every week.

[Young Drachma]

3 Eugene Monroe OL 6-6/319 Plainfield (NJ) Virginia
This strong, agile and smart blocker is the class of this year's offensive tackles.

Good to see Cardinals representing.

It's so bizarre that my hometown has magically become a hotbed for football talent over the past decade. In the 80s and early 90s, we never sent anyone anywhere.

Now, there are at least a dozen kids from PHS at D-1 schools and that's in the last 5-7 years. A recent NFL draft pick, players on national championship teams.

It's sooo bizarre, especially for such a small school. (1,600 students)

[Buccaneer]

With much more powerful PCs being the norm now, I don't see any reason why Jim (or GD) couldn't switch from an unrealistic region-based Visit Cost to a realistic locale-based one. I believe the size of the tables and the processing of such have gone up a magnitude since the original TCY.

[WSUCougar]

slight carryover of recruiting points from one season to the next...yeah, Minnesota won't land Asher Allen, but because Lockwoood showed up today, he established a connection with the Tucker coaching staff--a connection that won't just be completely reset to zero next season.
I really like this concept. Not only do you recruit individual players, but you develop relationships with high schools and form "pipelines" or at least get your foot in the door.

[st.cronin]

You know how in TCY you get a message saying 'player x doesn't like your defensive coordinator'? How about 'player x's high school coach doesn't trust you to do what's best for player x' and 'player x's high school coach feels good about the possibility of player x playing for you.' It could be based on previous recruiting trips - if a player from that school started for you, that would make the coach like you. If you had previously revoked a scholarship, that would go against you.

[Klinglerware]

You know how in TCY you get a message saying 'player x doesn't like your defensive coordinator'? How about 'player x's high school coach doesn't trust you to do what's best for player x' and 'player x's high school coach feels good about the possibility of player x playing for you.' It could be based on previous recruiting trips - if a player from that school started for you, that would make the coach like you. If you had previously revoked a scholarship, that would go against you.

That's a pretty good idea--HS coaches seem to have a bit of influence on recruiting decisions...

[Izulde]

Not sure if this has been mentioned or not, but I just wanted to bump this and add that I really really really really *really* want the ability to add, edit, delete, or otherwise customize recruits.

[CHEMICAL SOLDIER]

I want a create your own universe for college football.

[jetpunk2000]

Grr...fooled again.

[RoastDuck]

With much more powerful PCs being the norm now, I don't see any reason why Jim (or GD) couldn't switch from an unrealistic region-based Visit Cost to a realistic locale-based one. I believe the size of the tables and the processing of such have gone up a magnitude since the original TCY.

Would love to know if Jim concurs with this. IRMC he has a policy of testing the performance of his products on a cranky old machine. As you say, clock speeds have increased substantially since TCY was launched and data processing should not be such an issue now.

[Ben E Lou]

Bump/sticky in light of 12/16 announcement.

[Airhog]

If you could combine the immersiveness of the world of FM, with a game like BBCF or TCY, I would never leave the house.

[st.cronin]

If you could combine the immersiveness of the world of FM, with a game like BBCF or TCY, I would never leave the house.

I think I would starve to death.

[33sherman]

Go TCY2!

[gottimd]

I think I would starve to death.
Well what if the new version cooks for you too?

[cartman]

Gawddangit,

Good thing I upgraded my ISP account so I'd have enough bandwidth and storage to run a BBCF and a TCY2 league....

:D

[st.cronin]

Well what if the new version cooks for you too?

That would be great. But then I would go insane from not sleeping, and lose all my friends because I stopped showering.

[cartman]

True...but I'd want my ideal college football sim to explain the scenario to me somehow, so I'd understand that it WASN'T a bug.

"Ryan decided that, when it came right down to it, he knew that he'd never win a championship under Mack Brown." :D

You go to hell... You go to hell and you die!!!

(sorry, I slipped out of character for a sec... :D )

[waltwal]

it has been a long time since i played this game so i can't be too specific about any updates but let me suggest a general plan for the game

this game was absolutely no fun to play. i love college football but i felt like a secretary dealing with this game. my suggestion is too allow the computer to deal with some of the repetitive tasks and let the coach deal with gameplanning and recruiting. also really upgrade the gameplay aspect of the game.

the same is somewhat true for the pro game. i played the earlier editions of fof with real enthusiasm but as the game progressed i found it more and more tedious.
one of the problems with football is that it can be a very tedious game to play. i speak from 28 years of coaching. it takes about 10 hours of work off the field to about 1 hour on the field. in many ways that is the beauty of coaching football but ultimately when you keep adding realism to the game it means more and more work and it is after all a game and not real life.. fof became a game where dealing with the salary cap became a real challenge.

my suggestion is to break down both games into different jobs. let's take the pro game. there should be 4 jobs- owner,gm, salary cap manager and coach. you can decide to take all 4 jobs or any 1 individually. as owner your job is to simply hire the right people and watch the game unfold. since the other jobs could be separated the game can be as realistic and detailed as possible without becoming overly tedious. i would prefer to be the coach and really get into gameplanning for opponents however this means a real upgrade in the area of scouting opponents so that you are gameplanning for a specific opponent based on past games and individual players strengths and weaknesses.

the college game could be broken down even more. ad,coach, o coordinator, d coordinator and recruiting director. the o and d coordinator could also be in the pro game. once again the player would have the option to take all the jobs or decide on just one or a combo. this allows the game to really expand and become extremely intricate but the tedium brought on by the intricacy can be downplayed by simply deciding not to take on all the jobs.

i like football more than baseball but i much prefer sim baseball over sim football. a good and intricate baseball sim is simply more fun to play than a good and intricate football sim. i think that the solution to this problem is as stated. allow for the player to take on individual jobs.

[CraigSca]

Though I'd like an FOF6, TCY2 is long overdue and I'd happily pay more than the suggested retail price for an update.

[cthomer5000]

Once again, I think it would make sense to simply combine the Solecismic 8 and the Independents (only 3 remain) to fill things out and solve scheduling issues. Basically have this "Independents" division be Notre Dame, Army, Navy, and X teams from the state of your choosing (8 team division? 9? 10? 12?). This probably sucks for those Notre Dame fans, but oh well!

[Kodos]

This probably sucks for those Notre Dame fans, but oh well!

Then I'm all for it! :D

[BYU 14]

You go to hell... You go to hell and you die!!!

(sorry, I slipped out of character for a sec... :D )

Make him bring you back a Juice Box too ;)

[Ben E Lou]

Bump. Un-stick. Can be found via the reference thread...

[nilodor]

I'd like to see new recruits come in at a generic position. For example you would recruit a player who is a lineman and then you can decide what position you would like to have him play, some positions they would have a higher rating then others. So if you recruited a lineman his potential at centre might be 77 but at DT his potential could be 88. Of course you wouldn't know what position would be best for him, maybe this is where coaches could come in. If your scout is good with lineman he could narrow the best positions down for you to 2 or 3, if he's bad then you might not get any help narrowing it down.

Quick think on "groups"

Skill Positions -> RB, WR, TE, CB, LB, S
Lineman -> C,G,T,DE,DT
Quarterbacks -> QB
Specialists ->K,P

There would need to be more stats or ratings available to help you decide which position is best but I think it would be interesting non the less.

[dawgfan]

At this point, my priority suggestion is that TCY2 be the next Solecismic release. I mean, c'mon - the pro fans have had 2 full versions released since TCY and 4 total. Us college fans are due.

[Peregrine]

Amen! I am sure hoping the next game is TCY2, for the exact reasons above, it badly needs an update and since it ties into the existing FOF system a better TCY will make both games better.

[sovereignstar]

Amen! I am sure hoping the next game is TCY2, for the exact reasons above, it badly needs an update and since it ties into the existing FOF system a better TCY will make both games better.

How would a new TCY make FOF any better?

[WVUFAN]

The last football sim released though is a College game -- Bowl Bound. Since it's a superior game than TCY was, I would want another FOF version first.

[CraigSca]

Not to start yet another flame war...but I still like TCY more than Bowl Bound.

[sovereignstar]

Not to start yet another flame war...but I still like TCY more than Bowl Bound.

As outdated as TCY is, it's still a mile ahead of BBCF for me.

[dawgfan]

As outdated as TCY is, it's still a mile ahead of BBCF for me.
I tried the BBCF demo, and while there were a lot of cool ideas it just didn't convince me in the same way that TCY did. There's something about the way Jim designs his games that really draws me in. That's not to say there aren't a bunch of things I'd like him to add or change - see my suggestions earlier in this thread - but he's got a better base to build off of IMO.

Also, the release of BBCF to me is further reason for Jim to respond with TCY2 and attempt to re-claim the text-sim college football market. EA Head Coach treads into pro football sim territory, but I don't think it's nearly the same level of overlap of FOF as BBCF is of TCY.

Just like FOF4 used many of the innovations Jim introduced with TCY, I'm sure we'll see many aspects of FOF2004 rolled back into TCY2 and new innovations put into the next FOF. That's the advantage for Jim in focusing on the football market - he can share R&D between the two titles.

Of course, my real wish is that Jim would take a break from football for a year or two and give us Front Office Baseball - just like BBCF didn't quite do it for me, I haven't really been able to get into the OOTP or PureSim series. I have a feeling Jim could nail a baseball sim in a way that others (for me) haven't.

[sovereignstar]

If I wasn't in an online FOF league, I'd want TCY 2. As it is, FOF needs security (and badly) because of the Justin Shipmans out there and a few extra enhancements, along with the typical engine tweaks. If security isn't in the works, it's a no-go. I don't trust people anymore - I've seen too much.

[dawgfan]

I'd like to see new recruits come in at a generic position. For example you would recruit a player who is a lineman and then you can decide what position you would like to have him play, some positions they would have a higher rating then others. So if you recruited a lineman his potential at centre might be 77 but at DT his potential could be 88. Of course you wouldn't know what position would be best for him, maybe this is where coaches could come in. If your scout is good with lineman he could narrow the best positions down for you to 2 or 3, if he's bad then you might not get any help narrowing it down.

Quick think on "groups"

Skill Positions -> RB, WR, TE, CB, LB, S
Lineman -> C,G,T,DE,DT
Quarterbacks -> QB
Specialists ->K,P

There would need to be more stats or ratings available to help you decide which position is best but I think it would be interesting non the less.
Not a bad idea. One of the interesting things about football recruiting is projecting what positions they'll play in college. A H.S. RB might put up great numbers, but his size and athletic attributes convince a recruiting coordinator that he'd make a bigger impact on the college level at CB. Or a coach looks at a big S (6'1", 210 lbs) with the frame to grow and projects him as an OLB (or an OLB as a DE).

One of the frustrations I had with TCY was that positions seemed to be too rigid, and switching positions felt like a blind guess. I think that there should be a method of previewing a scout's best guess of how well a position-switch would work before doing it. In addition, depending on the nature of the switch, the amount of actual ability lost should vary. A C switched to G shouldn't lose that much actual ability, but a C switched to NT should lose a lot more due to the much different nature of the positions. While much of the techniques learned for playing C will translate to playing G, that's obviously not the case for going from C to NT. Also, it would be cool if the ratings or attributes for players gave clues that a position switch might result in an increased amount of potential.

If position-switching were amended as described above, it would solve some of the recruiting issues of position-grouping described above - you could recruit that extra OT instead of a needed G knowing that there's a good chance that OT could slide over to G without losing much (or perhaps even gaining). Still, it would also be cool to see recruits be graded in multiple possible positions. Maybe your scout sees that 6'0", 215 lb kid as a RB, while another school's scout likes him better at S, and a third likes him best at OLB. Acutal recruiting is fluid like that, and it would give more of an interesting challenge in my opinion of filling up recruiting classes than simply going down the checklist of positions - OK, need a QB, a RB, 2 WR, a T, G & C, etc.

For even more intrigue, you could include in the player attributes his own feelings of what position he'd prefer to play. If you recruit him at his preferred position, you get an advantage over a school that doesn't. But if you bait & switch him and immediately change his position after signing, he'll be unhappy and have a high(er) chance of deciding to transfer to a school where he feels he'll play his preferred position. Of course, if you play him at his preferred position and he sits low in the depth chart for a year or two, he may soften his stance and be less upset if switched to another position.

[33sherman]

I think that there should be a method of previewing a scout's best guess of how well a position-switch would work before doing it. In addition, depending on the nature of the switch, the amount of actual ability lost should vary.

Cosign. This would be great. The way it works now you end up completely demolishing some players by trying to switch them.

TCY is awesome (I STILL play it more than any other sim) but it really needs an update.

[Dutch]

TCY sure could use an overhaul, that's for sure. And it really doesn't even need multiplayer added.

Just thinking of some of the tweaking that could go into the game has me excited. If the Education Issue is fixed, the conferences updated, some simplified way to do scheduling is worked so conference movement can happen, and continued improvement of the recruiting process, the game could be just what the doctor ordered.

And considering that FOF2k4 is actually pretty good right now, you have to expect the next title to be TCY2.

[nilodor]

For even more intrigue, you could include in the player attributes his own feelings of what position he'd prefer to play. If you recruit him at his preferred position, you get an advantage over a school that doesn't. But if you bait & switch him and immediately change his position after signing, he'll be unhappy and have a high(er) chance of deciding to transfer to a school where he feels he'll play his preferred position. Of course, if you play him at his preferred position and he sits low in the depth chart for a year or two, he may soften his stance and be less upset if switched to another position.

I really like that idea, I think that would make the decision making process harder. Your scout sees this player as a very good safety, he want to be a running back, your loaded at running back. Do you take a pass, sign him as a running back and switch him over or try to recruit him as a safety and risk losing him?

[st.cronin]

I would like to see a tcy that had solecismic's engine and interface and bbcf's feature list.

[dawgfan]

I really like that idea, I think that would make the decision making process harder. Your scout sees this player as a very good safety, he want to be a running back, your loaded at running back. Do you take a pass, sign him as a running back and switch him over or try to recruit him as a safety and risk losing him?
Yeah, in general I'd like to see more meaningful interactions with the players and other characters in the game than Jim currently has. I know that this kind of thing adds a whole new level of complexity to the programming, but it would really add to the immersiveness of the game. A lot of what makes college football recruiting intriguing to follow isn't present in Jim's current recruiting model. He's got a good base to build from, but there's a lot of room for additional gameplay decisions that would also make the game more realistic. EA's NCAA Baseball does a nice job IMO of modeling player happiness/unhappiness based on playing time and recruiting promises.

Similarly, I'd like to see more real-world interaction with the AD in the game - I wan't to know as a coach if I'm on the hot-seat with the school administration and/or boosters, rather than get to the off-season and find myself fired and having it feel like it's coming completely out of the blue. Of course, the whole hiring/firing logic needs a major overhaul anyway. This is an area where Jim could borrow heavily from what EA has done with NCAA Football.

[Vegas Vic]

There have been some excellent points made already, so I’ll confine my comments to the two areas I’d like to see addressed.

I would like to see academics de-emphasized to a more realistic level. There should be some top 1000 players who have that as their main priority, but prestige and distance should be the dominant themes. Also, with the current emphasis on academics, it is way too easy to build up a program by just recruiting a bunch of smart guys for a few years, and thus jacking up the school’s academic rating.

For immersion purposes, I would like to see a more realistic model of talent dispersal from the states that are actually football factories. A top 1000 list should be saturated with players from Florida, Texas and California, with Ohio, Pennsylvania and some other states figuring in prominently also. In the current version, I believe that every high school in America is included, whether or not they have a football program. It should be relatively easy to get a fairly accurate representation of athletic preparedness, where we would be much more likely to see a blue chip recruit from Los Angeles (CA) Crenshaw, Shreveport (LA) Evangel or Southlake (TX) Carroll than we would from some obscure high school in Maine that’s never turned out a single recruit. This is a big deal to me, and I believe that SkyDog has alluded to this in the past as well.

[WSUCougar]

Top o' the Wishlist: Release date in the (very) near future

:D:D:D

[dawgfan]

Top o' the Wishlist: Release date in the (very) near future

:D:D:D
Couldn't agree more...

[CraigSca]

TCY2 needs "player runs into own coach and fractures the coaches' leg" code. If this code is not included, it wouldn't be very realistic.

[MizzouRah]

Solevision needs an appearance in TCY!

[Adgnash]

As outdated as TCY is, it's still a mile ahead of BBCF for me.

I am just getting into BBCF and enjoying it (although losing, but I took a small school).

Could you elaborate on some specific reasons why you like TCY better as a comparison for me (I havent tried TCY yet)? I do realize this is just your personal opinion, but I value it from people who have played both games.

Thanks

[st.cronin]

I am enjoying BBCF a lot. To my surprise, it's pretty much what I wanted TCY2 to be.

[33sherman]

While watching KSU-Texas saturday I kept thinking to myself that it was just like a TCY game--underdog builds a huge lead on some unlikely plays, then tries to hold the powerhouse off as it scores quickly to try and overtake them. You get that same feeling of powerlessness in TCY when you're trying to pull off an upset (and all you can do is count on your gameplan and watch).

[timmynausea]

There should be a greater emphasis on athletic quarterbacks and rushing the quarterback, I think. From Michael Vick to Vince Young to Troy Smith, it is here to stay.

The spread offense and zone blocking would be cool additions, too. Or just some general updates to the offensive and defensive schemes that are available.

I also really like the ideas of making the high school talent dispersal a little more accurate and making position switches more common/work better.

[CraigSca]

ping: this thread


Just a reminder for Jim as to how much a TCY update would be appreciated :)

[MizzouRah]

Now that FOF 6.1 has been released, besides having exhibition stats being kept for those 5 weeks, I think the game is almost perfect as far as I'm concerned.. or at least to the point I'm extremely satisfied.

With that being said, there is only 1 text sim that has made me feel like a boy amoung men, that game is TCY.

I couldn't win a championship to save my life. In fact it's so frustrating and fun, that I have to take breaks away from the game or I'll get really stressed out. (and I love that)

Please Jim, it's time for TCY 2. My biggest addition would be to have my staff handle time allotments for my players - a "recommend" button if you will. Other than that.. I'm so ready for TCY 2.

[dime]

this game was absolutely no fun to play. i love college football but i felt like a secretary dealing with this game. my suggestion is too allow the computer to deal with some of the repetitive tasks and let the coach deal with gameplanning and recruiting. also really upgrade the gameplay aspect of the game.

it means more and more work and it is after all a game and not real life.. fof became a game where dealing with the salary cap became a real challenge.

to really expand and become extremely intricate but the tedium brought on by the intricacy can be downplayed by simply deciding not to take on all the jobs.

amen. a modern head coach in college football is more of a CEO than anything else...I want to be able to establish a culture, a brand and pursue players and coaches who fit my philosophies well. should be able to emulate the star wars offense and speed miami had in the 80s, or nebraska's option offense and strength (their weight room was in its own class for many years) and so on. if I want to run a renegade program like dennis erickson and just throw talent on the field and go 9-2, I should be able to do that. if I want to try and build a program up by stressing defense and special teams like frank beamer did, I should be able to do that.

I don't want to worry about how many hours some guy should spend with his girlfriend and so on...I'd rather have sliders. If I'm recruiting stupid players, I'll have to move a slider to address that, sacrificing time they spend studying plays or whatever. maybe I need to spend more money on things like tutoring programs instead of new weights or something. If I'm a renegade program, maybe we play fast and loose with the faculty instead. Once my team slips to going to non-new year's bowls however, the enemies I've created will start sqawking about my dirty program. (unless I'm in the SEC, then the boosters string me up instead)

at no time in TCY did I feel like it actually mattered what formation I was trying to stock, or what kind of players I was recruiting. that made it real old real fast because my program seemed so generic.