Scholarships, Cutting Players and Roster Limits

[PowerofRed25]

In my OD, we hard cap the scholarship limit for the 11 user teams at 20, with the ability to gain one additional scholarship for every two players who go pro. Transfers count against the limit, players who transfer out do not give you a waiver for extra scholarships. Reasoning behind that being, if guys are transferring, you probably broke a promise to them, so shouldn't get rewarded extra scholarships.

We do this for a few reasons:

1) Despite the Heisman recruiting difficulty, we are all elite 5 and 6* teams. We could sign whomever we wanted, whenever we wanted. It helps keep balance and forces users to be more picky.

2) The more top level recruits the users sign (and then subsequently cut), the less top level recruits CPU teams get. It is already hard to make the CPU a difficult opponent, 3-5 years down the line when they have less and less talent available to them, they'll be insanely easy. This adds about 50 talented recruits into the recruiting pool for CPU teams.

3) It is ridiculous to over-sign. It is way too easy to recruit in this game and there is no reason to sign 25 guys a year. There is no way you'll get to play that much depth and there is no reason to develop depth when you can just sign a better freshman next year.

[thelasthurtknee]

i think its cheese. I dont even offer more scholarships during season than I have available. like real life. I have recruiting on heisman and its still so easy. So many good players go unrecruited till late in year. I never have under a top 30 class even with a 2 star team. The cpu is dumb and if you load up then your just gonna kill them even worse in a few years. if your playing dyansty and plan to put some years in then do it the right realitic way. but if you just wanna win at all cost and dominate the cpu every game then go for it. i have used the no cut rule since recruiting started on this game. and with the huge bonus you get each week for having a scholarship offered especially now that the cpu recruiting logic is so bad on offering scholly's I had to use a new rule to not even allow more offers than available. I still have a full board but just might only have 12 schollys offered if thats all i have leaving as seniors. you will still dominate recruiting and the cpu. so really no point in cheesing it up.

cheese is used to describe strategies or ways of playing that are really powerful and do not require much skill from the players side at the same time

the cpu cant and doesnt do this so thats why its cheese. hell 10 weeks in the season most cpu teams have only offered 10 to 15 guys scholarships. thats why you see so many top ranked players in week 10 that still only have 1 or 2 teams on their board and are in the top 10 phase still of schools. these guys are easy pickens. they really dumbed the cpu recuriting logic down for some reason no matter the level.

[Executor]

Great thread!

Now, don't I loose prestige even if I cut guy whom I made some PROMISES to? I mean, there might be a difference between offering a scholarship and making promises... What do you think?

[PocketScout]

Quote: Originally Posted by thelasthurtknee

the cpu cant and doesnt do this so thats why its cheese. hell 10 weeks in the season most cpu teams have only offered 10 to 15 guys scholarships. thats why you see so many top ranked players in week 10 that still only have 1 or 2 teams on their board and are in the top 10 phase still of schools. these guys are easy pickens. they really dumbed the cpu recuriting logic down for some reason no matter the level.

Actually the CPU does over sign. Look at the top classes in week 5 of the offseason, most schools will have 16-18 commits, but on signing day the game will go through an assign the remaining players to teams and on when you check top classes on signing day most schools will have 25 signed.

I have seen the massive over signing the cpu does. I've seen years where the top class will have signed 25 players but once you advance to the regular season only 14 of those players are left on the roster.

Your point about recruiting on Heisman being easy is valid though. In the prepatch details they did acknowledged that the CPU is not offering scholarships like it should. We have all seen multiple times were the CPU has a soft commit and never offers a scholarship to the player and you can go in and steal this player away. I am hoping the patch directly fixes this issue and in turn should help boost the difficultly a little in the process.

[slingblade73]

I stay at 70 and never over recruit. It gives guys on the roster time to develop and also when the time comes to recruit a stud 5 star, you roster works in your favor. I only have 12 open spots this season and 5 of them are 5 star guys.

[slingblade73]

The other issue I would like to see tested is if you promise a guy and cut him, do you take a hit on that. I would think so. This could apply to incoming freshmen or a RS Sophomore.

[OmahaKnights]

Quote: Originally Posted by tarek

I also think I'll have to recruit heavily mainly because UCLA is a 2* school and there are no 4* recruits even interested in UCLA. I've resorted to trying to target any 4*s who only have 2 schools interested in them.

My advice is to load up on 3*s instead. 4*s are nice and all, especially if they're in your pipeline, but another thing you have to be aware of is just who's offering them. It's easier to poach a 4* from a San Diego State than a USC, for instance. If you try to take players from USC as UCLA, you're just wasting valuable minutes. One nice thing about the game and the recruiting system is that it rewards patience. If you succeed and get a bump in prestige, you'll get those coveted 4* recruits before long. You don't even really need 5* players to win. The AI is so easy to outscheme that a team full of 3-4* players can carry you to the natty.

Quote:

Thanks for the tips on the positions that are in high demand. I just wonder if I should have 2 kickers and punters on my team? I just think it puts too much pressure by only having one of each especially in the punter/kicker class is poor when your ONLY punter/kicker is a senior.

No. Your kickers and punters never get injured, and if for whatever reason they do, you can just use your kicker or punter to fill the position for the other on the depth chart. The only time I ever have more than one of each on my team is if I'm redshirting one while the other's a senior, and I never have two punters and two kickers at a time.

Quote:

In terms of a random question, IRL if a player who has accepted a football scholarship gets cut, do they still have that scholarship to get a degree? Can they still attend the university academically? If so, even if it's not represented in the game, it would put me a little more at ease when over recruiting.........some type of karma thing.

No, they don't have a scholarship. They can still attend the university if they pay for it and if they're able to academically. It's been something that's weighed on a few consciences over the years. If I remember correctly, it's why Georgia Tech left the SEC in the 60s, so it's far from a new issue.

[jwilphl]

I'd give you some general advice on recruiting, but I imagine you play NCAA '13, and I'm still playing NCAA '12. AFAIK the recruiting system was modified a good bit between the last two iterations, so I'm not familiar with all the new aspects.

I know in NCAA '12 I tend to use all my scholarships if it makes sense to do so. The CPU fills up as much as it can, and I'll often go after guys interested in my school just to try and field the best possible team. I've had very poorly rated 3 and 4-star guys come in, but 1-star freshman is rated a 74. It doesn't happen often but it certainly does happen. In that regard, I'll also sink more resources into positions of need for that reason (goes without saying).

If you see you're Junior heavy at a position, especially a position where recruits are thin like offensive line, corner, safety, et cetera, then it's definitely useful to recruit ahead of time before you need to actually target those guys for all the seniors you're graduating. In that same vein, you'll notice you can recruit more leisurely at the HB and WR position because there are so many of those guys available. I notice 4-star guys that get ignored by everyone just because those positions are so deep. It's silly and I wish they would fix it in the future.