Attribute/Slider Research Thread

[The EVHL]

Quote: Originally Posted by HeadCoach2.0

You know something I thought I was crazy when I was looking at some of the attributes of the Lightning players and was noticing how similar the numbers are despite the ratings difference. When NHL 24 comes out I will am going to use custom rosters. I am convinced that they work better now. Thanks for this information. It seems that this slider is the one thing that EA got right the first time. It allows you to control how effective the players are across the board. It is actually pretty genius to be honest. I may do some experimentation with the slider to see how it affects the gameplay.

Yeah you're not crazy haha! I know SnipeNScore does a ton of throwback rosters. Tougie does a roster too for franchise play I'm pretty sure.

Unfortunately my rosters on a game before roster share but my 20 ones are "esport" roster so teams are 100% even/balanced but it gives me flexibility to make some "global attribute changes" that drastically effect gameplay in ways I like.

One of the most prominent being the "aggressiveness" slider with CPU goalies (I use 36/100 - much more realistic goalie play.) Another being acceleration and agility where I have those actually maxed out at 99 for all players and use "speed" as the big differentiation point between players. Not sure this is the "best" way to go, but it makes balancing my players classes and tuning my slider values much easier.

But yeah, these are the things I'll probably keep breaking down in this thread when I get a moment to write-up my research.

[The EVHL]

Here's a link to my game using a 95 Preparedness Effect along with my "secret sauce" so to speak lol. Game is right where I want it to be. Don't think there's too much more I want to tweak.

[PernellKarl076]

Quote: Originally Posted by The EVHL

Here's a link to my game using a 95 Preparedness Effect along with my "secret sauce" so to speak lol. Game is right where I want it to be. Don't think there's too much more I want to tweak.

Hey HipNotiiC 👋😉

The new logo and the site looks dope… Congrats on that. Love your players name too, Ovenchicken, McDangles and Calamari to name a few, lol !

Great stuff !

[The EVHL]

Quote: Originally Posted by PernellKarl076

Hey HipNotiiC 👋😉 The new logo and the site looks dope… Congrats on that. Love your players name too, Ovenchicken, McDangles and Calamari to name a few, lol ! Great stuff !

Appreciate it haha. Yeah, the "base" players who are on every team have default names like that. Had some fun with it since it's an esport haha.

It's been fun seeing the amount of users slowly creep up. I think we have about 20 or so guys now throughout the league.

[HeadCoach2.0]

I am still having good results with the preparedness slider at 95.

I have played multiple games with it at 95.

You don't even see a increase in the number of hits at all. What happens is that the hits you do make have much better quality. Not only that but I noticed that the CPU really gets into you when they fight on the boards with you. They really bounce you around now when they try to get you off the puck with a simple bump.

Even off the puck guys can get just flattened out there now. It really adds to the randomness of it all.

Another element that I think that it has added is that it is much harder to skate the puck into the offensive zone. Zone entry is harder now because the defense can get you off the puck.

I might bump it up to 100.

[The EVHL]

Quote: Originally Posted by HeadCoach2.0

I am still having good results with the preparedness slider at 95. I have played multiple games with it at 95. You don't even see a increase in the number of hits at all. What happens is that the hits you do make have much better quality. Not only that but I noticed that the CPU really gets into you when they fight on the boards with you. They really bounce you around now when they try to get you off the puck with a simple bump. Even off the puck guys can get just flattened out there now. It really adds to the randomness of it all. Another element that I think that it has added is that it is much harder to skate the puck into the offensive zone. Zone entry is harder now because the defense can get you off the puck. I might bump it up to 100.

Glad you’re liking it! I’ve been loving it as well. I legitimately have had periods with like 10 combined shots (maybe less) if I don’t play hockey the right way and get pucks deep and create turnovers because zone entries are so much harder.

I will be doing another write up today on the balancing of back skating and puck carrier skating. Not to give people the exact values and go “these are foolproof” but to simply discuss the meaning of the gaps and how that looks during gameplay.

[PernellKarl076]

Hey HipNotiiC, I wanted to do one on all the Skating Attributes 😉😆

But yeah, I’m very busy on the 20 minutes set right now, so be my guess 😀

[The EVHL]

Alright, let's have a follow-up breakdown to some checking values.

Quick updates to checking:
1. Preparedness to 100/100
2. Speed Effect to 100/100
3. Size Effect to 100/100
4. Checking/Balance Rating Effect to 100/100
5. Hit Power to 0/100
6. Incidental Contact to 100/100
7. Fall and Stuble Ease to 100/100
8. Stumble Threshold to 80/100

Results:
As you can see, I've put checking results totally in the hands of ratings and physics by isolating the "hit power" slider to 0. I believe all of these sliders combined in NHL 20 (use at your own risk in other games) has lead to an incredible amount of dynamic hitting results. Everything from little bumps to game misconducts if you line a small guy up with a big guy from behind. It really makes you feel like the physical game is present while also making you think before you finish a check when there's a huge size and speed discrepancy from a bad spot.

Most of these values are self-explanatory, but I wanted to breakdown both the fall and stumble ease and stumble threshold sliders so more people can understand what they should be seeing when adjusting and how to balance these out.

We'll start with the Fall and Stumble Ease, I think it's the easier one to test and see results. This slider is very easy to understand and your tests will be instantly recognizable. The higher you go, the more of those kind of cool, kind of clunky at times "stumble falls" will happen. Think "player to ice" not just the basic "chest lean" stumble animation. With the right checking sliders, this slider is very fun to see play out because there's a lot of good puck separating animations that start appearing here. You'll actually push carriers to their knee's resulting in clear possession changes rather than a moshpit of guys stumbling and losing the puck over and over to incidental contact.

It's important to note that this slider seems to have a decent relationship with "Stumble Threshold" which is why I am breaking this down after the fact. Stumble Threshold determines how much players stumble - this is the given description. What they don't tell you is that when you push this closer to 100, it becomes extremely easy to stumble. Some of you might think "well that's a good thing right?" but i want to caution you that having this too high will actually lead to LESS stumble and fall animations as the stumble threshold is so high that players will ALWAYS just stumble. This leads to basically a million little stumbles which require an animation that actually cancels out the ability for the stumble and fall animations to take place. So you're left with a bunch of tiny little bumps and ragdolls with little between.

My solution for this?
I have put my stumble threshold in the 65-75 range. There will still be stumbles, but when paired with 100/100 incidental contact and 100/100 stumble and fall ease values, you'll see a wider range of outcomes. The little bumps will still result in stumbles but the higher impact incidental bumps and checks will result in more stumble and fall animations which give a much better reward to proper defense and body positioning.


As always, my values aren't meant to be taken literally, I just like to show them so you can see my thought process and how they interact with the other sliders I've mentioned. It's one big puzzle, the key takeaway is that you'll want to have a higher stumble to fall value than your stumble threshold value if you want more dynamic checking outcomes. Too high of a stumble threshold will result in everyone looking like they're walking with a cane while simultaneously being unable to fall. It's a clunky mess. So if you're seeing too many weird "cane walk" bumps due to incidental contact, try lowering your stumble threshold and upping your stumble and fall ease so that players can actually fall and possession can more cleanly change hands when appropriate.