AI Trade problem/bug/bad decision - thoughts

[Bode]

Hello,

I've been playing this game for about a week. I've ran 3 different simulations for 3 years so far. I've won the bowl 8 of 9 times. Losing in the bowl the 9th. I play on wall street, and with 200 level injuries. I'm winning because I feel this must be an AI trade bug that hasn't been found to date.

Every time I start a new game I do a complete draft. I choose a QB, RB, WR first, then a couple high end defense players, one more WR, 5 more defense starters, and then 5 offensive lineman. All these players are starters, with fairly high endurance and intelligence. They are almost all in thier first 5 years of thier career, especially the RB, one WR, and a couple defense in their first 2-3. Then I make sure to get my punter and kicker in rounds 21 and 22 giving me some great players there. Once all my starters are picked I then fill in the backup positions with whoever seems to fit.

The AI doesn't make the same good decisions and has lost every time in the first season. I played one season with my backup QB the entire season, as my starter got injured in the preseason for 18 weeks. I still went 13-3. I did have my starter for the playoffs.

Ok now for the bug. So after the first season, which you will obviously do great in because of the quality of players, you then have 5 exhibition games. During this period it is possible to do trades. After the 4th game you can look at the exhibition standings and the standings from the previous year and figure out who the crappy teams are probably going to be. Based on age of players and contract lengths you would want to try to trade up for a better pick in the draft to fill those holes.

When you offer your #1 pick (super bowl winner) for thier #1 pick (worse team in the game) they agree right away. No negotiations, nothing. That just doesn't make sense. The AI should at least want multiple picks, or a player or something. So what this does is assure you of the top picks in the draft every year. As your experienced players demand higher contracts you just let them go and draft the hottest rookie right in thier place. So you have a winning record until the end of time.

Obviously, as a human player, you can just choose not to do this kind of trade, which I have decided to do in my new simulation, but it then limits a facet of the game. You basically can never trade draft picks because the AI isn't smart enough to make good decisions. Based on my cap room I would gladly trade 2 or 3 picks for a specific one in certain circumstances in order to keep my team solid. So at the moment I cant really find a way to use the trading feature effectively besides just offering away players with picks to try and keep it fair.

What are other players thoughts on this?

Outside of this major issue, this game has an extremely solid AI from my experience so far. I love the injuries and the contract negotiations. I love the hold out feature. I think the roster management is excellent. The statistics are quite realistic for a simulation game. The players being upset is great. How they get along with each other is also cool, however, I haven't figured out how this effects how they play. I love that a great player can become a bust after an injury. The salary cap is awesome.

The only major problem feature I've found is the trading. I haven't found it useful at all. I haven't made 1 trade with an actual player, and the other teams have made a total of 1 trade with a player. They do trade draft picks though which is how I discovered this trade problem.

The other features I've found hard to understand are the weight training and the summer camp. Both of these things have not really done much for my players at all. With weight training all I can really tell is that it increase endurance by 1 if you bulk up, and decreases it by 1 if you trim down. The summer league has had no effect at all on the 9 people I sent. At least not as far as I can tell.

Anyways, this post got rather long. I didn't want to just point out a bad feature. I think this is an excellent game overall, and I am just hoping for feedback from other players or the developers.

[AlexB]

Hi Bode, I think you hit the nail on the head - a certain amount of house rules are required if you want to play the game single player...

There was a discussion about multi-player leagues as to whether a certain action which would be considered unrealistic IRL was fair in FOF - this led to a debate about whether people were trying to beat each other in football or in a computer game - I think from your post you are able to beat the game, but you want to play a football game.

The only way you can do this is to restrict yourself slightly - for example, you are right - AI trading is a little dubious at times, so with draft picks I base any offers I make on the draft pick value charts you can find on the web, and I never try and shaft the AI.

Similarly renegotiating contracts - I am a bit looser than some on this (some never renegotiate), but I only ever renegotiate in week 1 of the pre-season, as this is the only time the AI ever does. Otherwise it is too easy to be well under the cap.

Adopting something similar, to deliberately stop yourself exploiting loopholes you may have found in the AI is the only way to go for now.

It also has to be said that the AI is much stronger in FOF2007, and I'm sure from just my 2-3 years playing the game that it will continue to develop.

[bselig]

Yeah, the pick-for-pick thing has been a bug for years. Sometimes they'll make you throw in a 7th round pick or something. It's pretty easy to avoid though, but seems like it wouldn't be too hard a fix. Trading players, you used to be able to swap players(in the last years of their deal) for picks with some regularity, but it doesn't seem to work in 07, even with QBs. I pretty much never trade players

[JeffW]

Yeah, we all wish trading AI was better. My best advice is to follow simple rules:

No pick trading during regular season.

No trading future picks or players.

Trades must be fair draft chart value.

[Ksyrup]

Trading players, you used to be able to swap players(in the last years of their deal) for picks with some regularity, but it doesn't seem to work in 07, even with QBs. I pretty much never trade players

This has been a bit of a disappointment for me. I never went overboard with trades, but I Iiked to fill in some mid-level draft picks by trading decent guys in their last years to free up some cap space. It's especially disappointing since it seems like trading players in the NFL has increased in the past few years (at least that's my perception), but is pretty much absent in FOF2K7.

[Ben E Lou]

Yeah, the pick-for-pick thing has been a bug for years.I do not think that word means what you think it means.

[kcchief19]

I do not think that word means what you think it means.
I think the word he's looking for is "exploit."

If you want to exploit the AI, you can do it in almost any text sim. Pretty much everything bode describes are what I'd define as "cheats." You can do it, but the only reason to do it if you want to do well without much of a challenge.

I've yet to see the text sim that can respond adequately when a human does something that defies explanation. Who would offer a first round pick for a first round pick? You could argue that the AI expects to win the Super Bowl every year and values your pick more, but it's probably more likely that the AI sees the two picks as equal value.

If you want to exploit the AI in 2k7 or pretty much any text sim, you can certainly do it. There's nothing wrong with it if that is how you want to play. Nothing to be terrible proud of in my opinion, but whatever floats your boat.

[wade moore]

I think the word he's looking for is "exploit."

If you want to exploit the AI, you can do it in almost any game. Pretty much everything bode describes are what I'd define as "cheats." You can do it, but the only reason to do it if you want to do well without much of a challenge.


Fix it for ya.

[MizzouRah]

Funny how he then did it every single year. :)

[Ben E Lou]

I think the word he's looking for is "exploit."

If you want to exploit the AI, you can do it in almost any text sim. Pretty much everything bode describes are what I'd define as "cheats." You can do it, but the only reason to do it if you want to do well without much of a challenge.

I've yet to see the text sim that can respond adequately when a human does something that defies explanation. Who would offer a first round pick for a first round pick? You could argue that the AI expects to win the Super Bowl every year and values your pick more, but it's probably more likely that the AI sees the two picks as equal value.

If you want to exploit the AI in 2k7 or pretty much any text sim, you can certainly do it. There's nothing wrong with it if that is how you want to play. Nothing to be terrible proud of in my opinion, but whatever floats your boat.Well-said.