How good is Rex?

[sawblade300]

When you rex the defensive game plan let's say...how good is that? Does Rex take into account the current team you are playing? Or is it just a general recommendation for the defensive group you have?

[gstelmack]

Rex does a reasonable job against the AI. Rex can be taken major advantage of by another human.

[sawblade300]

I guess my more specific question would be: if you hit rex prior to setting your defensive game plan...how accurate would it be against your upcoming opponent?

[Ben E Lou]

I guess my more specific question would be: if you hit rex prior to setting your defensive game plan...how accurate would it be against your upcoming opponent?It is "accurate" in the sense that if your opponent has a strong o-line and RB and weak WRs, it will adjust to expect the run more, and if their strength is in the passing game, it will adjust to expect the pass more. However, it has its limitations. First off, Rex does not adjust to the opponent's game plan from previous weeks or performance, just perceived talent. A major issue there would be if facing a team with a 40/40 QB and great BPR receivers with mediocre overall ratings. We humans know that such a team can be deadly in passing, but the AI would view such a team as not a real passing threat, so it would adjust to expect the run more.

But the biggest issue with using Rex is that it suggests Run Aggressive on 1st and 10 a fair amount, no matter what.

And Greg is correct, an experienced player will bury you if you are known to use Rex on defense. A division opponent (i.e. one who plays you twice a year) with experience may notice that you are using Run Aggressive a fair amount and deduce that you are Rexing defense, and may adjust his game plan accordingly.

[sawblade300]

Thanks guys. That helps a lot. I don't Rex my game plan, but was wondering if when playing an unfamiliar team, if I rexed the D initially then tweaked it...how close it would be to planning against said opponent. I would never Rex and leave it. I'm bad enough on my own without rexy's help.

[lastcat3]

One interesting thing about rex though (I believe you all are implying that rex is the computer coach for your team gameplanning and calling the plays) is that rex does seem to gameplan around particular players and he also learns from his mistakes.

For instance in one year I did I was Dallas and the other good team in my division was Washington. Washington had a decent qb and receiver but their greatest weapon was that they had the best running back in the league (he gained 1800 yards or more every single season).

During one of the regular season games my defense took almost everything but that running back away. He ran for a lot of yards and they would also throw lots of screen/short passes to him and gain 10/15 yards at a time. The result was that Washington ended up beating me rather handily because they were still able to move the ball consistently down the field using him.

I played Washington again in the playoffs and this time my coach seemed to make a gameplan to take him away. He only gained like forty or so yards on the ground and when they tried to throw the ball to him they were either incomplete or he would get tackled after only gaining a couple yards. At the same time though Washington's top receiver gained over a 150 yards and had a very good game. The result however was that I ended up beating Washington because they were not able to move the ball as consistently with their receivers as they were with that all-star running back.

[gstelmack]

Did you check the actual defensive gameplan used there? The difference in those games could simply be dice rolls. I've had a sim where I beat a team handily, but something happened and I had to restart, and they beat us handily on the resim. It happens.

[lastcat3]

Did you check the actual defensive gameplan used there? The difference in those games could simply be dice rolls. I've had a sim where I beat a team handily, but something happened and I had to restart, and they beat us handily on the resim. It happens.

The gameplans were different. I just didn't sim the game I actually watched the play by play (as I like to do for my games) and it happened far to much and the playcalling was too different for it just to be coincidence. The focus of my defense really seemed to be elsewhere in the playoff game(they don't all of a sudden start throwing to the receivers twice as much and start running and throwing to that running back twice as less because of dice rolls).

I realize that the computer AI will never be as good as a human (as it shouldn't be because if it was too tough people would be far more likely to give up on the game because they were losing all the time) but when the computer is playing against itself it still does make for some interesting scenarios. When I look at the gameplans for various games the coverage schemes and run/pass ratios often do change from the previous time I played that same team.

[lastcat3]

Probably the biggest advantage that a human brain has over the computer AI is that the person can adjust there strategy while the game is going on. I don't think the computer AI makes many (if any) in game adjustments. But I do believe the computer looks at what has worked (or hasn't worked) in previous games and makes adjustments from that.

And the computer adjusting to its opponents over time isn't anything new to AI. The computer AI has been adjusting to what you do as early as 2002 or 2003. I played NCAA football '06 a lot and if something was successful for me for awhile the computer would eventually adjust and begin taking that away (for instance if I was having a lot of success with a particular passing route the computer would eventually start keeping a LB or safety in that area to close that passing route off (or at least make it more difficult to throw it)). And you know the computer AI is going to be even better in FOF than it was in those PS2 video games.