Minor Details that must be fixed for 18.

[Kentaurus]

Okay I'm not going to go into sweeping changes I want to see in the next game, just minor things that should be easy changes to fix and improve the game. As a note I only play in 32 user franchise leagues so my fixes will certainly be geared around that mode.

1: Offensive Formation Details: When making a defensive playcall we are only told how many RB/WR/TE the offense is putting on the field. This needs to change to showing us the player names/number of the guys in play. The old NCAA games did this, showing player numbers and allowing the defense to choose a play based on that information.

There is a big difference between the Patriots when Legarrette Blount is in the game vs Dion Lewis. Defenses should be told which guy is going to in the formation so they can plan accordingly.

I mean this is the difference:
NCAA 14

Madden 17


2: Practice/Gameplanning/Development whatever you want to call it. It has to go to all players on the team, nothing is worse than having position groups not develop any because they don't get practice. There is no week in the NFL where any position group doesn't practice.

So here is the simple fix, you still pick a gameplan like this year, it still gives the in game boosts, I like that idea. However instead of giving XP to only 2 of the 3 position groups, you get equal XP for everyone, they all practiced. You can still pick 3 (or I'd suggest 4... 2 offense, 2 defense) players to specifically target and boost. And the the total XP could still be the same amount.

The reason for this has many points though, first is everyone actually does practice every week. Second is to avoid potential abuse, no more officially listing guys at positions they don't actually play so they can gain XP from a drill the user would rather run. It was particularly bad on defense where a user could move all of their DEs to OLB, run any OLB/DB drill and get XP for almost the whole defense. This became an issue many commishes had to manually watch to ensure it wasn't being abused.

#3 Don't restrict what I can spend XP on based on position. Sure many things don't make sense, but don't restrict it please. Some things do make sense, or have reasons and I don't like having to move a player to a different position to purchase those skills. Some examples, Defensive line can't buy Big Hitter, LB can't buy catching upgrades, HB can't get impact block upgrades, MLB can't buy swim/spin/power moves. Those all have some potential value to guys at those positions.

#4 Adjustable Traits- Some traits need to be adjustable rather than only upgrading one way. Primarily this affects DB coverage which flows from Conservative to Balanced to Aggressive. This affects how they play the ball in the air, and I'd like to be able to adjust this based on my system. It is fine that it costs XP to change, but there are players who might have "Aggressive" that I'd rather be conservative and unfortunately the game doesn't let me downgrade that trait.

Likewise QBs other the other major issue where the "Sense Pressure" and "Force Passes" traits aren't even upgradable. Instead they are just inherent to the player, who never develops.

EDIT:
#5 Free agency- currently under a system where the person who is online closest to advance is sure to win since they will simply outbid you and have a general idea of how good your offer is. Fixing this is easy, keeping with the 3 round FA system, Bids are blind, you don't get to see how other offers stack up. At advance if a player is still undecided then it will show the top bids from that week. Players can now adjust accordingly, though once again new bids are blind and others cannot see improved or withdrawn offers. Repeat for the advance after the 2nd week.

#6 Undraftable Players - This is just dumb, players you may have scouted become undraftable and can only be picked up in free agency after the draft. Yes I get that teams sign players every year that don't get drafted, and gems can be found. But forcing us to take them later when we would draft them is just asinine.

#7 Practice Squad - The way the PS works is generally fine right now. But in the several leagues I am in, preseason normally gets simmed through pretty quickly as most don't care to play that part of the league. However only being able to put guys on the PS in week 4 creates a problem. While it may not be perfectly realistic allowing players to put guys on the PS in any of the preseason weeks would be of great help so they didn't have to worry about players getting cut if they miss the single week (week 4) that this is allowed. Ideally guys on the PS would still be able to play in preseason games, but that might be asking for too much in this post.

Option B: Don't force any player cuts until week 4, this way the leagues can sit on that week (like they typically do for resigns) and allow players to move guys to their PS and make cuts.

#8 This one might be more of a wishlist item, but simple enough. Commissioners need the power to reset a played game in the current week. Things happen, people might break house rules that are set up to avoid abuse, new owner might join the league and have their team already being played that week, etc. I get that a lot goes into a game reset, stats need to go back, any news things need to be pulled, standings and records. But still don't think there should be that much to it.



I'm sure I'll come up with more as I go through my games this week, others will also post things. I'm not looking for mechanic changing plans or broad suggested ideas, simple things with simple improvements.

[GameBreaker35]

The personnel system from NCAA 14 I've been hoping for a while now brother. Here's to '18 being the year 👍.

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[SilverBullet19]

#1) I agree, it should show who the personnel is, as opposed to just the amount of WR, HB, TE etc. That would add some realism. It is just as important to note who is in the game as it is to note the positions.

#2) I may be wrong, but in my experience everyone does get XP in practice and the positions/people you target get extra points. Maybe I just don't pay enough attention, but I agree that all players should get XP.

#3) I honestly don't mind how they restrict it much. It keeps upgrading players easy and focused on their specific position. That being said, I can see it being an issue for really in depth guys who want specific things from a position that isn't a common trait.

#4) Ehhh...not an issue to me. Each time you move up, it positively impacts play. These traits aren't titled well, and can be misleading. For example: the conservative "play ball" really seems to translate to piss poor coverage when the ball is in the air. Conservative leads one to believe their defender would swat instead of catch, ETC. In reality it just means they're 5 yards out of position. So with that, I see no benefit to switching a guy around in that category. Many others are similar.

#5...this should have been posted in the "Madden 18 wishlist thread" instead of a new thread, just sayin lol

[Kentaurus]

Quote: Originally Posted by SilverBullet19

#2) I may be wrong, but in my experience everyone does get XP in practice and the positions/people you target get extra points. Maybe I just don't pay enough attention, but I agree that all players should get XP. #4) Ehhh...not an issue to me. Each time you move up, it positively impacts play. These traits aren't titled well, and can be misleading. For example: the conservative "play ball" really seems to translate to piss poor coverage when the ball is in the air. Conservative leads one to believe their defender would swat instead of catch, ETC. In reality it just means they're 5 yards out of position. So with that, I see no benefit to switching a guy around in that category. Many others are similar. #5...this should have been posted in the "Madden 18 wishlist thread" instead of a new thread, just sayin lol

To answer all of those, you most definitely do not get xp for everyone on the team, only those two position groups.

The play ball can be very detrimental if you have someone with limited coverage skills and awful catching trying to play aggressive, they will give up big plays too frequently when I'd rather them just be safe. And those traits affect how they attack the ball in air far more than anything else. (That said I generally switch back to user control, but for those that want CPU control they shouldn't have to fight this). The QB traits may be even more important, and certainly should be adjustable with a large amount of XP spent.

And yes it probably could have gone in with the wishlist stuff, but I specifically wanted this to stand away from the generic "I'd like better WR/DB interactions or OL/DL etc." The most important thing IMO is for weight to actually affect the games physics, but that is a far more challenging and mechanical issue to program, and beyond the scope of this where most of these could be implemented with very few man hours.

[Alex the Great]

Quote: Originally Posted by Kentaurus

2: Practice/Gameplanning/Development whatever you want to call it. It has to go to all players on the team, nothing is worse than having position groups not develop any because they don't get practice. There is no week in the NFL where any position group doesn't practice. So here is the simple fix, you still pick a gameplan like this year, it still gives the in game boosts, I like that idea. However instead of giving XP to only 2 of the 3 position groups, you get equal XP for everyone, they all practiced. You can still pick 3 (or I'd suggest 4... 2 offense, 2 defense) players to specifically target and boost. And the the total XP could still be the same amount. The reason for this has many points though, first is everyone actually does practice every week. Second is to avoid potential abuse, no more officially listing guys at positions they don't actually play so they can gain XP from a drill the user would rather run. It was particularly bad on defense where a user could move all of their DEs to OLB, run any OLB/DB drill and get XP for almost the whole defense. This became an issue many commishes had to manually watch to ensure it wasn't being abused.

To build off of this, I think they should just have two practices for offense and defense. For defense you would choose between drills for your interior lineman (in a 4-3, DT and a 3-4 DE and DT), edge rushers (in a 4-3 that's DE, in a 3-4 that's DE and OLB), linebackers (4-3: OLB, MLB, 3-4: MLB) and DBs. Then you do the same for the offense as you do now, where there are already four position groups, but you just pick two drills instead of one. And you can't overlap on positions either.

Obviously I would love for them to add more drills at the same time, maybe for beating more route combinations and specific plays.

Then my idea is to give the CPU some better perks than just bronze medals every time. I want the coach's level to affect how often they get higher level medals. My general idea was to give a level 1 coach a 1/6th chance to get gold, 1/6th chance for silver and 2/3rd chance for bronze. Then at whatever level is the highest (around 50 if I recall correctly) the chances are 1/6th chance at bronze, 2/6th chance at silver and 1/2 chance at gold.

This way there is some benefit to having a higher level coach, and they can affect progression in a meaningful way.

For the 32-user online leagues, I propose that you actually have to play the practice and you only get one shot after the tutorial, so you can't automatically get gold every time. Then if they want to sim the drills they can fall under the same rules as a CPU team would, as I listed above.

[Kentaurus]

"For the 32-user online leagues, I propose that you actually have to play the practice and you only get one shot after the tutorial, so you can't automatically get gold every time. Then if they want to sim the drills they can fall under the same rules as a CPU team would, as I listed above."

Too many users would hate this, and would sim anyway, which would unbalance the playing field. I don't want to do the practice every week.


Also added a #5 as I just got burned in FA because someone was able to log on closer to advance than I was. (I went to bed last night with the top bid).

[Hova57]

In practice mode in CFM to run plays to get 1st down and TDs..

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[4thQtrStre5S]

According to this one test - Defenders, outside Corners, specifically, do better with either Conservative or Aggressive trait for attacking ball in air...Balance seems to cause the Corner to get confused at times; probably AWR issue there...

http://www.muthead.com/forums/madden...-vs-aggressive

It would seem to make sense - Balanced anything, in the game, would suggest more inconsistent play, thus making it more difficult to predict and defend overall..

I generally look for aggressive outside Corners, and inside linebackers...Conservative safeties, and outside linebackers I am good with conservative, but do prefer aggressive if I can find it..Seems to help in attacking slants and drags..

If I recall correctly, Seattle's defense has LB's Wagner and KJ Wright as aggressive, and they cover really well, even though their zone and M2M isn't the best..