Franchise mode consensus.

[Steelers4190]

CFM gets better if you do a 15 year sim at default XP sliders. Ratings are lower accross the board and played games feel more like real football. Players have strengths and weakness and arent as well rounded. Which makes having SS and X dev guys even more important on your team. You can have a team that's a 73 overall win 11 games becuase they have 3 x factors at key positions like QB, WR, and Edge because they carry the team making them better than they actually. While during the same season you can have a very solid roster with the same record or slightly worst because they lack those difference makers or are handcuffed by QB play. I like to super sim games that aren't my team so the only issue is for teams that have running backs under a certain rating threshold their running game is non-existent. But that can remedied through xp sliders at the start of the purge and such.

[Devaster]

Quote: Originally Posted by Steelers4190

CFM gets better if you do a 15 year sim at default XP sliders. Ratings are lower accross the board and played games feel more like real football. Players have strengths and weakness and arent as well rounded. Which makes having SS and X dev guys even more important on your team. You can have a team that's a 73 overall win 11 games becuase they have 3 x factors at key positions like QB, WR, and Edge because they carry the team making them better than they actually. While during the same season you can have a very solid roster with the same record or slightly worst because they lack those difference makers or are handcuffed by QB play. I like to super sim games that aren't my team so the only issue is for teams that have running backs under a certain rating threshold their running game is non-existent. But that can remedied through xp sliders at the start of the purge and such.

What I don't get is why are so many real NFL players so much faster than the CPU generated rookies? Most NFL players, even the scrubs, have better speed, acc, agi, and strength at their respective positions (especially agility).


I've gone through many franchises to test what the limits are to the physical traits of most positions and if you luck into a unicorn player at that position in a draft the physical traits will still be lower than 90% of the real NFL players at that position.


And CPU generated players tend to be pigeon-holed into some stats because of their arch type, where in the real life players can transcend their arch type if they are a generational talent. That is one of my major complaints with how the CPU generates rookies.


That is probably why the 15 year sim to clear out real NFL players helps create a more even playing field.

[tg88forHOF]

Quote: Originally Posted by Devaster

What I don't get is why are so many real NFL players so much faster than the CPU generated rookies? Most NFL players, even the scrubs, have better speed, acc, agi, and strength at their respective positions (especially agility).

Because CPU generated rookies don't have egos and expectations of what their Madden ratings should be, and they also don't have millions of fans who'll go to the barricades demanding EA change a rating those fans think is too low.

[Rondo is GOD]

Franchise is so frustrating. Honestly feels like they sat down in 2006 and said, how can we make a game mode that feels like a real NFL season? Instead of just making an accurate NFL season mode then fleshing it out to feel more realistic.

Yet I still play the sh*t out of it.. so.. I'm gonna shut up. Lol

[JoshC1977]

Quote: Originally Posted by tg88forHOF

Because CPU generated rookies don't have egos and expectations of what their Madden ratings should be, and they also don't have millions of fans who'll go to the barricades demanding EA change a rating those fans think is too low.

I know some folks will view this as a snarky response...but honestly, I have to agree with this.

Default roster ratings are BY FAR the biggest issue with franchise mode and gameplay. I think they did OK with relative ratings, but in many cases individual ratings are too high across the board.

The bigger issue is to what the quoted text alluded to. It's "OVR boosting" and this is primarily achieved by inflating a player's non-archetype traits and abilities to boost them to a higher overall. This causes a "drowning out" of player types and makes players feel too much the same. Very few NFL players are truly versatile enough to be star level (80+ OVR) in multiple archetypes...Madden's base rosters often have players that meet that for ALL archetypes.

What they need to do is to market player Overalls based on the player's archetype:

So like, "Tom Brady: 82 Overall Pocket Passer" instead of just "Tom Brady: 82 Overall". This gives the ratings team an opportunity to keep OVRs down, amplifying player/role differentiation, while still stroking egos.

[tg88forHOF]

Quote: Originally Posted by JoshC1977

I know some folks will view this as a snarky response...but honestly, I have to agree with this.

Yeah, for the record, my response was entirely sincere...no snark intended. Not that I'm not totally capable of it, this just wasn't one of those times.

I remember seeing a video when 20 came out where they got video of the reactions of the lowest-OVR player (non-long snapper division) on each team. A few laughed it off or otherwise took it in good humor, but most were at least a little offended...more than one had a remark similar to "bro, how you gonna have my speed that low?".

Players hassle EA over ratings sometimes, and EA has been known to accomodate them...either immediately, or a few weeks into the season via regular updates. If it's a player with a big enough name...if irritating that player could irritate either the NFLPA or a very large number of fans...EA isn't above throwing them a few rating points.

Let's not forget https://mobile.twitter.com/Chargers/...1%2Fframe.htmlKeenan Allen's rant over his ratings this year. They'd never admit to taking it into account when doing ratings, but I have imagine Allen getting on the Chargers' official Twitter account and saying "I definitely won't be playing Madden this year" is a thing EA cares about.

[J.hunt1376]

Quote: Originally Posted by tg88forHOF

Yeah, for the record, my response was entirely sincere...no snark intended. Not that I'm not totally capable of it, this just wasn't one of those times. I remember seeing a video when 20 came out where they got video of the reactions of the lowest-OVR player (non-long snapper division) on each team. A few laughed it off or otherwise took it in good humor, but most were at least a little offended...more than one had a remark similar to "bro, how you gonna have my speed that low?". Players hassle EA over ratings sometimes, and EA has been known to accomodate them...either immediately, or a few weeks into the season via regular updates. If it's a player with a big enough name...if irritating that player could irritate either the NFLPA or a very large number of fans...EA isn't above throwing them a few rating points. Let's not forget https://mobile.twitter.com/Chargers/...1%2Fframe.htmlKeenan Allen's rant over his ratings this year. They'd never admit to taking it into account when doing ratings, but I have imagine Allen getting on the Chargers' official Twitter account and saying "I definitely won't be playing Madden this year" is a thing EA cares about.

Along the "ratings-are-inflated" line, if the speed-40 time chart is correct, then Jerry Rice's 4.71 40 time would be a meager 82 SPD rating. However, his highest MUT card has him at a 94 SPD - equating to a 4.38 40 time. I think Madden puts too high a premium on SPD. Wes Welker and Danny Amindola are/were great WRs without having blazing speed. Jerry Rice wasn't burner, either. I think all OVRs should only be calculated per archetype.

[tg88forHOF]

Quote: Originally Posted by J.hunt1376

Along the "ratings-are-inflated" line, if the speed-40 time chart is correct, then Jerry Rice's 4.71 40 time would be a meager 82 SPD rating. However, his highest MUT card has him at a 94 SPD - equating to a 4.38 40 time. I think Madden puts too high a premium on SPD. Wes Welker and Danny Amindola are/were great WRs without having blazing speed. Jerry Rice wasn't burner, either. I think all OVRs should only be calculated per archetype.

Madden puts too great a premium on SPD, but both Madden and the general football public also put too much emphasis on 40 times when measuring speed.

The 40 time-to-SPD chart is accurate, but if anything, it's too accurate and too rigid...I know they want a simple "this measurement to this stat" setup because video game, but using that measurement as the sole determinant for that stat (especially that stat, given how much the game overvalues it) is where a lot of the trouble starts.

Rice always played much faster than his 40 time...in the current (speed inflated) Madden universe, 82 is far too low. That would be almost non-functional, certainly for a player of Rice's dominance; all the AGI and RR stats in the world wouldn't allow him to be as dominant as he should be.

But 94 is also too high, and clearly reflective of the peculiar non-reality that is MUT.

88 feels about perfect....with the RR stats Rice should have, he'd still play as dominant. Now imagine what they could do with stats normalization if they could point to the greatest WR of all time (arguably the greatest player of all time) and say "he had an 88 SPD".