Strictly from a gameplay point of view...

[RogueHominid]

Quote: Originally Posted by DakkoN

I dunno. There are plenty of flaws in this game that can ruin the whole game. Hot routing corners and Out routes are almost guaranteed catches and are ridiculously abusable. The CPU AI is just too dumb to know what to do on those routes and are defenseless against them. The animations put this game in a league of its own, but the exploits bring it back down to par.

For those deep outs, a good pass rush helps lots. Go tinker with a few blitz packages and you'll nip that mess in the bud. Those routes take a bit to develop.

The hot route corners vs zone are tough. Just don't play people who do that, as it's a known hole in the DB AI.

If you get corner routes by a TE called all day, call a cover 3. They'll still catch a few, but you'll get your share of breakups and picks.

[DakkoN]

Quote: Originally Posted by grunt

I have to disagree. I play with generic corners and stop out routes and corner routes.

Sure you can stop them if that's all you focus on, and that leaves the middle open. It's easy to stop if that's all the player does, but if it's somebody who knows what they're doing and abuses it, you're pretty much screwed.

[RogueHominid]

Quote: Originally Posted by DakkoN

Sure you can stop them if that's all you focus on, and that leaves the middle open. It's easy to stop if that's all the player does, but if it's somebody who knows what they're doing and abuses it, you're pretty much screwed.

Be selective . Every game has its issues, but I have to agree that on the field, this game is unparalleled in its ability to represent the richness and nuance of the game of football.

My advice would be to not play people who throw screens and outs all game and tell you its your job to stop it. It's a thinly veiled excuse for working around the fact that the other 10 players on the defense frequently don't recognize their responsibilities on those plays.

[vick5]

Gameplay is by far the best of any football game created. When I can drop back watch my receiver slip on his route, step up into a real pocket throw a strike to the back shoulder of my crossing WR it makes me feel like its real football..

[grunt]

Quote: Originally Posted by DakkoN

Sure you can stop them if that's all you focus on, and that leaves the middle open. It's easy to stop if that's all the player does, but if it's somebody who knows what they're doing and abuses it, you're pretty much screwed.

Nope.

Play a soft cover 2. Play outside technique and play off the wr. This take care of the out routes/corner routes and then hot route your middle linebacker to a middle deep zone. Now if your mlb has a pass coverage attribute the better. The mlb deep zone drop will help with middle. This is a buc cover 2.

This coverage scheme is still vulnerable to the deep corner routes and under routes unless you have great coverage safeties such as Cliff Harris.

There are quite a few plays to stop certain type of routes but not one play to stop all routes.

[RogueHominid]

It's true that there are plenty of ways to stop things, but no foolproof defensive play, and that's exactly as it should be.

Just to add to the deep outs playbook, I was labbing some Cover 3 looks versus the deep outs in practice, and there's one where the FS comes down and will actually sit under the route while the CB sits over the top of it. This one (forget the actual name, it's in the Nickle 3-3 set) is great if the opponent has 1 WR that he loves to go to. If there are two, the Tampa 2 is a better solution.

You can play good defense versus repetitive opponents using the Tampa 2. I did it in my league season, lol, and had plenty of success on D. However, you can abuse that defense with drags and corners by the WR, so you have to pick your poision.

The fact that we can have this discussion, which is about real football, is a wonderful testament to the fact that this game is, in fact, that good a representation of the sport. You can't have conversations this rich about every sports title.

[Pappy Knuckles]

My advice to you is to work on varying your defense. You should be trying to confuse the offense with different looks just like they are doing to you. I've been working on this aspect of my game a lot as of late and my defense has definitely shown improvement. You can't stop everything but that's just football.

[grunt]

So true, you have to set traps by using various defenses. I use coverage shells to change up my defensive look.