Had Just About Enough of Potential Ratings

[Argooos]

Potential is a silly idea for this game. Why can't we change it? I'll look at from two perspectives:
People who just want to have fun playing a game: Many people in this category might just want to play the game using their favourite player. Maybe they want to start a franchise with their favourite player (Thigpen in this case) and over a few years make him into a superstar. They cna't od this, however, because potential is a hard cap and you can't edit it ever. And don't just say "then edit him to be a 99 before you start the franchise" because that's not the point. The point is to start with him low-rated and work him into a superstar.
People who want a realistic football game: These people want franchise mode to function like th real NFL. In the real NFL nobody knows what any player's potential is until their career is over. In Madden you know every player's potential. The worst this is that you have no say in what that potential is. At least with player ratings you can change them if you disagree. Potential is controlled completely by the game developers. Two years from now there will be players in the league who are stars, but in Madden 10 they had C or D potential. In this way, franchise mode is not realistic.

What's the solution to the problem? Replace "potential" with "talent". The reason you can't exceed potential is that, by definition, potential cannot actually be exceeded. Talent, on the other hand, can be exceeded, at least in terms of prodcution on the field. That's all ratings are, really. Ratings represent how a player should perform on the field.
The way Talent rating should work is that, say a player has C talent. He could then easily reach a 70's overall rating, but to exceed it he would have a perform really well. So that HB with C talent that rushed for 2,000 yards, he would go up, but not as much as if he had A talent.
This method would still keep the spirit of the current system, just with a soft cap instead of a hard one. It would not, however, be a system that would allow a player to easily make their whole team 99 overall.

But for the love of god please allow is to edit potential!

[rws591]

Well, you can have an A rookie who is a 75 but if you never develop him, then he will never be good. The potential determines how much they can improve, while performance determines how they will improve within those parameters.

For instance, I had an A HB who I got to the low nineties in 3 years. I wanted to get a decent backup back for him, so I got guy from the free agent wire who was an 82 with six years in the league(from one of the madden draft classes). He was an A overall though. I think that he was either cut from his original team after the first or second year or never drafted and thus remained a free agent and never really progress since he had no game time experience. I decided to "trade" him to a team in need of an HB hoping that he would improve, but since he was already in his 6th year he never progress much. Complete waste of a guy with great potential because he was never recognized.

[Argooos]

Quote: Originally Posted by rws591

Well, you can have an A rookie who is a 75 but if you never develop him, then he will never be good. The potential determines how much they can improve, while performance determines how they will improve within those parameters. For instance, I had an A HB who I got to the low nineties in 3 years. I wanted to get a decent backup back for him, so I got guy from the free agent wire who was an 82 with six years in the league(from one of the madden draft classes). He was an A overall though. I think that he was either cut from his original team after the first or second year or never drafted and thus remained a free agent and never really progress since he had no game time experience. I decided to "trade" him to a team in need of an HB hoping that he would improve, but since he was already in his 6th year he never progress much. Complete waste of a guy with great potential because he was never recognized.

In-game performance is only one part of progression. Matt Stafford will progress in year two pretty much no matter what he does in year one.
The only thing you example really shows is that players in free agency don't progress. I think most people already knew that.

[ddanese1978]

Quote: Originally Posted by Lucicren

I thought it sounded like a great idea, but seriously I am getting extremely irritated with it at this point. I am a huge Tyler Thigpen fan, and I think he did a great job playing for the Chiefs last year. I hear he is traded to Miami and it's a great opportunity for him to start. I trade him in my franchise to see that he only has a C Potential. What's the point of starting a franchise around one of my favorite players to know I can't progress him past 79? It's my opinion that EA should either scrap Potential Ratings, or just give us an option to turn ratings off entirely and give us nothing but Vertical, 40 Speed, etc. I think that would make it such a better game for Franchise players, and it still gives an option.

I COULDNT AGREE WITH YOUR MORE!!! Its such a JOKE to have "potential" ratings on players and capping their limit on ratings!! I mean it just doesnt make any sense. BASICALLY we all (the general public and Madden players) have to deal with who the people at EA sports "thinks" is a good player and who isnt!!! I mean what is that!! I mean who are they to say who is gonna be good or bad this year? Who is gonna be a break out player and who isnt?? I mean they have no 3rd-6th rounders as an "A" potential or even a "B"!! Basically if they had been doing this for the last 2- 3 years.. Then M.Turner would NEVER been able to be higher then a 79 overall if you started a franchise 2 years ago!! Or Jamarcus Russell would have been an "A" potential just cause he was the #1 overall pick.. even though 2 years later he is trash!!!

Potential Ratings should go up BASED ON THE SEASON YOU HAVE WITH THAT PLAYER IN YOUR FRANCHISE!!!! NOTHING ELSE!! No "caps" on players.. Breakout stars happen ALL THE TIME in real life.. so why cant they in our franchises.. Who is EA to say Thigpen cant be great in a couple years?? Can they see into the future??? I dont think so! What makes franchise so much fun is the fact that you can use your favorite player and after 2- 3 great years he should be a SUPERSTAR!

I am a Lions fan and I think A.Brown is gonna be really good someday.. BUT even after 4 good years in a row he is only a an 81.. and THATS ALL HE CAN GO!! Matt Stafford won the MVP 3 out of 5 years.. and he is a 92.. THATS HIS CEILING!! If someone in real life won an MVP 3 years out of 5 he would be a 99 OVERALL in Madden!!! It just doesnt make any freakin sense why they put caps on players overalls!!!

THIS NEEDS TO BE CHANGED.. It makes the game NO FUN TO PLAY... Like you said.. why start a franchise with a player who is deemed a "C" potential when you KNOW no matter what.. even if you lead the league in passing every year and set all kinds of records.. YOU CANT BE BETTER then a 79 overall!!! I mean... Who came up with this dumb idea????

[txfalconfan]

he did play pretty good but i dont think hes the next marino. Just like Cassell did good for the pats with brady out but I doubt he'll be what KC hoped for.

[Meast21Forever]

Quote: Originally Posted by Argooos

Potential is a silly idea for this game. Why can't we change it? I'll look at from two perspectives: People who just want to have fun playing a game: Many people in this category might just want to play the game using their favourite player. Maybe they want to start a franchise with their favourite player (Thigpen in this case) and over a few years make him into a superstar. They cna't od this, however, because potential is a hard cap and you can't edit it ever. And don't just say "then edit him to be a 99 before you start the franchise" because that's not the point. The point is to start with him low-rated and work him into a superstar. People who want a realistic football game: These people want franchise mode to function like th real NFL. In the real NFL nobody knows what any player's potential is until their career is over. In Madden you know every player's potential. The worst this is that you have no say in what that potential is. At least with player ratings you can change them if you disagree. Potential is controlled completely by the game developers. Two years from now there will be players in the league who are stars, but in Madden 10 they had C or D potential. In this way, franchise mode is not realistic. What's the solution to the problem? Replace "potential" with "talent". The reason you can't exceed potential is that, by definition, potential cannot actually be exceeded. Talent, on the other hand, can be exceeded, at least in terms of prodcution on the field. That's all ratings are, really. Ratings represent how a player should perform on the field. The way Talent rating should work is that, say a player has C talent. He could then easily reach a 70's overall rating, but to exceed it he would have a perform really well. So that HB with C talent that rushed for 2,000 yards, he would go up, but not as much as if he had A talent. This method would still keep the spirit of the current system, just with a soft cap instead of a hard one. It would not, however, be a system that would allow a player to easily make their whole team 99 overall. But for the love of god please allow is to edit potential!

This. I agree with you 100%. This years design team kept saying how much 'control' the user would have and how the player could play madden how they wanted. With potential ratings, that completely negates that. I feel like certain attributes should fluctuate regardless of in game performance- such as strength, awareness, acceleration, etc. Rookies that don't play, they get stronger working out. They get in better condition, they learn the playbook, recognize things on the field more, etc. Things like that should progress regardless of play time. But other things should go up based on performance. Speed, agility, break tackle, etc. (things that occur in games) should progress only with game performance. Along the same line, if my 54 rated rookie throws better than drew brees and tom brady, he should go way up. maybe not to 99, but he should be much better than in the 60's (which is how he would currently progress).

I'm kind of just rambling at this point. Basically, potential sounded like a bad idea to me. I still think it's a bad idea and I'd really like them to take it out or drastically alter it.

[Trevytrev11]

I've "pitched" this idea for a baseball game, but this is how I think the potential system should work.

1) The players max potential rating is an exact number that is never known by the user. A player can only achieve their max rating as the result of perfect and optimum circumstances (see below).

2) As a coach/GM in franchise, you are responsible for hiring scouts. The quality of your scouts will determine how accurate your measure of the players potential is, but the potential that you see is always a range. The worse the scouts are, the wider the range (say 20-25 point range) and the better the scouts are, the narrower the range (say 5-10 point range). The players actual potential can fall any where in this range and isn't just the mid point of the range.

3) As a coach/GM in franchise, you are also responsible for hiring your positsion coaches. The quality of coaching at your players position as well as other factors ( your teams offense, your supporting players, etc) will determine how close he can come to reaching his max potential and again narrow the range you see closer to where he is actually at, though you will never know if he actually is there or not.

Here is how I vision it to work.

In each example the player at hand is the same, he is an above average QB with a max potential of say 85 (but you never know this)

Ex 1: You have crappy scouts and view this player with a potential of 65-85. The other QB's available have ranges of 70-90 (Act of 75) and 75-95 (act of 80). You think your odds are best with player 3 (75-95) and end up drafting a worse QB. Luckily you have a decent (not great) QB coach and after your draft this player and work him out in the preseason, you get his potential up to a 70-75. This is his potential with the current circumstances. They could change if the system changes. Other teams looking to trade for this player with better scouts, would see a potential of that player in their system.

Ex 2: You have great scouts and see this player with a potential of 83-89. You see the second player at 70-76 and player three with a 79-85. You have narrowed the range down and know that player 1 and 3 are close and if you guess wrong, it won't be by much, so you go with player 1 because the odds are in your favor. Unfortunately your QB coach sucks and while his max potential is an 85, under the circumstances he will only play at a 75-80.

Maybe some of this is confusing, I'm confusing myself a bit, but I just envision a system in which you truely never know the players potential. You can range the potential based on the quality of your scouts and once you draft that player, his development toward the unknown max potential depends on how well he is coached and how good well all of the other pieces of the situation are.

Teams with quality scouts will find the Tom Brady's while teams with crappy scounts will continue to bust with the JaMarcus Russels.

A player isn't destined to be great because he has the potential to be great. He has to be in the right situation to suceed and for his potential to be realized. It would almost be a living system and nothing would be set. A player drafted by Team A may be destined to fail in one franchise. However if you replay that franchise and he is drafted by team B, he may go on to be a hall of famer.

[Megatron2k7]

As far as I know... the only time real scouts even try to take guess at a players potential ....... is physically only.

They will look at a guy, and their bone structure, muscle mass, etc, etc,... and say something like..... "This guy has room to add 15-20 lbs of muscle, and not lose a step."

They are guessing at their physical potential only. Some guys can get faster, stronger (without slowing down, or becoming injury prone), or just a lot better at basic fundamentals...... but no one knows from looking into some imaginary crystal ball how well a player will grow and learn from experience, and good coaching. Some will find themself in just the right system, and pick up the scheme perfectly, and become a superstar... other's will be stuck on the bench, injured, or just be a bad practice player that never amount to much, even though they are physically gifted.