TCY Question

[Swaggs]

A rare on topic post from me. A question for TCY veterans...

Do you find that placing the Sol 8 in the same state as the established university you run (ie: Sol 8 in Florida and you pick FSU, Miami, or UCF) is an advantage or disadvantage?

My thoughts are split on this one.

On the one hand, there are more players available in state (as per the help me), so you should, potentially, be able to grab more volume of whatever quality you are accustomed to getting.

On the other hand, one, and probably two, Sol 8 teams will rise up in prestige and probably start to become similar to your, or better, at recruiting quality players.

So, if I am a UCF w/ the Sol 8 in Florida or an Akron w/ the Sol 8 in Ohio am I making things easier or more difficult? I ask because I am an alright TCYer, but not great. I want to build up a team like Akron or UCF and then get a better job, and I don't want to spend 30 years at .500 watching Sol 8 teams beat up on me.

Thoughts are appreciated. Thanks.

[MylesKnight]

Good Question!!

I actually have no answer though as the Sole-8 in my UCF Dynasty has been placed in the Great North, Alaska.

Good Question though, I'm sure one of our fellow FOFC/TCY brethren has the answer.

[Vince]

In my personal experience, the benefit from the glut of extra potential recruits far outweighs the detriment of 1 or 2 powerhouse teams from the Solecismic 8. Placing the Solecismic 8 in the same state your university is established in is an advantage, in my opinion.

[Swaggs]

bump (don't want to lose this one overnight).

[Darkiller]

Yeah but what about recruiting then ?

We all know that it is easier to recruit home-state high school players because they tend to favor the local college but if the Sol8 conference in the same state as your team, than that will give even more opportunities for home-grown products to choose from...and actually reduce your own "state prestige" and therefore your ability to recruit them...

[Darkiller]

dola.

Actually -but I may be wrong and this thread could help me learn some more - I have always made sure not to place the Sol8 in my team's state.

[Alf]

Placing the Solecismic 8 in the same state as the School you run is an advantage => more recruits. I found this in all my games played.

[timmynausea]

I've played quite a few dynasties with and without the solecismic 8 in my state. I think if you're in a pretty big state it can be beneficial, but in a smaller state it doesn't add enough quality recruits to actually help. It's hard to say with any real accuracy, as things vary from year to year, but I remember playing as West Virginia and even with the Sol. 8 in the state, there weren't too many additional high quality prospects compared to times I had played as WVU with the sol. 8 in different states.
While I don't think it is something that would make a huge difference either way. I usually put it in a neighboring state that usually has a lot of recruits anyway to make it even more valuable to recruit from that state without entirely losing my "home recruit" advantage in my state.

[Swaggs]

Anyone else have any thoughts on this before I start a new career?

[albionmoonlight]

I don't know how the distance algorithim works, but one thing you could do would be to change the latitude/longitude of the S8 schools to all be bunched in one corner of your state so that the majority of the state's population base is closer to you. I don't know if distance matters enough over small distances to make it worth it, but it may help to give you a small edge.

[Buzzbee]

I don't have any definitive proof, but I tend to play with them NOT in my home state. I want to attract the cream of the crop in my home state. With one or two stronger Sol 8 teams in my state I find that, even though there may be more recruits, I run the risk of losing out to the other schools.

I look at it this way: Even though there may be more total recruits, how many of those are going to be ones that you are going to go after? By adding 8 schools to compete against it seems like the additional recruits won't offset the extra competition.

I'd be curious to find out exactly how many recruits the Sol 8 adds? Is it a set number? Or does it depend on the population of the state? If it is a set number, then putting it in California or Texas will have minimal impact, whereas putting it in North Dakota could be substantial. If it depends on the population, then putting it in California or Texas seems like it could really boost the talent pool while not adding much competition.

This would probably be pretty easy to test. Simply start a game with the Sol 8 in Delaware and count the total number of recruits. I'd probably do this 3 or four times just to see if there is much randomness or variation to the number of recruits. Then I would start a game with the Sol 8 in some other state. Once again I would do this 3 or 4 times to see how much, if any, variation occurs.

To take it a step further, once you have determined and "average" number of extra recruits in Delaware, run the same test in California to see if the number of additional recruits seems to be based on population, or a fixed number.

I would do this, but have several other games that I am into and prefer not to expend precious gaming time on this test.

In a few of my TCY dynasties I have put the Sol 8 in Hawaii. This tends to mitigate the "distance" factor since everybody, except the Sol 8 and U of H are at least 2000 miles away. Tends to put everybody on more of an even keel in competing for the 'extra' Sol 8 recruits.

[Craptacular]

I always put the Sole 8 in Hawaii to, as Buzzbee mentions, even things out as much as possible.