Problems with the recruiting aspects of the game...

[Adam_in_SC]

In your mind, which is the most frustrating part of the recruiting program:

A) Being forced to pitch by random draw an aspect of your school that you would NEVER play up

or

B) Seeing players commit to schools in week 6 with no committable offer from the school?

These two items drive me nuts.

First if I have a D+ in conference rating and the player is very high on that then why in the world would I ever even think of talking with him about it when I'm his #2 and a comparable level SEC school like Vandy is #1? There is no benefit for me in pitching this aspect of my school and in reality would downgrade my chances with the player. "Hey I know you really value a strong conference with a rich history so let me tell you about MAC conference!" Yea, that's not going to work yet we are forced to play Russian Roulette with our limited 10 hours each week simply hoping we can avoid that topic... ESPECIALLY given the fact that it is in the context that WE brought it up as it is in the game. This is beyond stupid.

Next item on my list... PLEASE tell me in what world players commit to a NCAA D-1 team WITHOUT a committable scholarship offer? It does not exist. If you actually follow real recruiting you hear every week about a guy who wants to commit but does not have a committable offer yet in this game it is OK, just say you are going there and shut it down. I mean it's one thing for the #1 recruit to commit to Alabama or Texas because you know they will get an offer (as they always do in the game) but its a 3 star OL who has Alabama or Texas #1 and you trail by 750 points and they commit without an offer to a team that already has 5 OL in the class who are better it makes no sense! What about we make it real life and let Alabama or Texas lead for a kid until the last week of the season even by 750 points if we know that reality will set in an they have to settle for a school where they actually have an offer. It's not like these guys are going to walk on as out of state students at these school in real life very often yet is more than commonplace in the game.

I love the concept of the game but there are just some things that make me feel as if it was all done by computer guys rather than sports guys. It is the simple things that go a long way. Start by fixing the passes broken up by LB's who are 15 yards in front of the play. Passes follow an apex curve and LB's cant jump 15 feet in the air to get it at it's highest point. Fix it to where WR's jump rating actually matters and make them go up and get the ball at the highest point they can rather than waiting for it. a 6'4 WR should NEVER have a problem with a 5'8 CB in the back of the endzone on a fade pass. That is why coaches call it in real life!

What this series needs is REAL competition from another programing company. Free market competition would have 90% of the problems in this game fixed BEFORE it was released. Bring on some sports guys to help you find the fatal flaws that get players frustrated. It's not that tough nor is it that expensive after all the coin that EA makes on the game.

The last two paragraphs simply turned into a rant so let me ask my question simply:

What do you like about the recruiting process and how in your mind could the EA team improve it?

[ViLLiO]

The fact that elite prospects only have 2-3 offers. Give me a break they should have 30-40 offers before the season even starts.

This makes landing 5-6 five star prospects relatively easy for the user.

[Adam_in_SC]

Quote: Originally Posted by ViLLiO

The fact that elite prospects only have 2-3 offers. Give me a break they should have 30-40 offers before the season even starts.

I agree, I actually did see on center who was a 4 star #1 at the position and #27 overall who had 35 offers. Sadly in that same class the #1 QB was the #4 overall and had 3 offers.

[Az2k12]

I agree with your points and answering your question I'd probably have to say not very much at all. I feel like they could implement the interest system a lot better. Just calling a recruit over and over for an hour a week could get annoying potentially and isn't really realistic because you can talk to a recruit as much as you want about leaving the state to go play at USC, and how much better it is there, but if the kid's Most interest is staying close to home, he's going to play for Florida State. I just feel like these should matter a little more and it shouldn't be based on points. There's gotta be a system out there that works a little better? I fight falling asleep while I'm recruiting, because once you have your guys selected..there's no fun really haha which is also a big problem for me

[GGGswim]

I proposed the idea, several times last year, of some type of weighted system. If a recruit from Ala.'s Most is Conference Prestige and you are Buffalo, guess what, it's going to come up more often in calls than, say, Early Playing Time which you may be A+ for him but it's Least for him.
On the flip side, if Playing Time is his most and Conference is his Least, you'll probably pick up points on that pitch many weeks 'cause it's going to come up more often and you'll reap the reward.
What always ticked me off the most about the current system -- and don't get me wrong, recruiting and trying to build my roster is just as fun as playing the games -- is the number of negative bullets in the Russian roulette style. How come Acad. Prestige comes up every other time for me (my team started dynasty as B and is now, almost always, D) after I change topic once, but my A+ topics come up once an hour?

[TDenverFan]

Quote: Originally Posted by GGGswim

I proposed the idea, several times last year, of some type of weighted system. If a recruit from Ala.'s Most is Conference Prestige and you are Buffalo, guess what, it's going to come up more often in calls than, say, Early Playing Time which you may be A+ for him but it's Least for him. On the flip side, if Playing Time is his most and Conference is his Least, you'll probably pick up points on that pitch many weeks 'cause it's going to come up more often and you'll reap the reward. What always ticked me off the most about the current system -- and don't get me wrong, recruiting and trying to build my roster is just as fun as playing the games -- is the number of negative bullets in the Russian roulette style. How come Acad. Prestige comes up every other time for me (my team started dynasty as B and is now, almost always, D) after I change topic once, but my A+ topics come up once an hour?

I agree completely.

Coach, I don't give a crap about what conference you play in, and the MAC kinda stinks, but let's talk about it anyways.

[Ike Slider2]

I'd add on things negative pitches here they have a negative interest in something, and if yours is low then you benefit. And also not just hard sell ask for interest, I'd change it so you get lines of text that vary a bit and you choose one each with a different outcome. Then I'd fix the WR, ATH, RBs at the top, and make it so you can play some of your prospects games, RTG style. I'd add and All-American prospect game and also have prospects play ironman football for the most part. (He might be a 4* RB and a 2* DE). Then I'd up the number of scholarships a player will be offered and add variety to the number of pitches. Also, I'd make the pitches editable, to correct in accuracies or make sure pitches don't change. I'd also like to have assistant coaches make more of a difference in it like sending an assistant coach to go scout a game, and maybe unlock some ratings that way. However you'd have some rough ratings at the beginnings that would come from the web sites and maybe have a few so that you'd never be sure what it is without sending an assistant. Then I'd add talent hot spots like if you send and assistant to say L.A. he'd scout the guy you sent him to (say a 4*) but he'll see other prospects on the same team maybe find a 1* that is pretty good and maybe a (3* diamond in the rough) I think also outside the top few hundred recruits you really shouldn't know much about them so you have to send an assistant or just guess. It'd be cool to see high school stats and maybe a GPA factored in (some schools having a GPA requirement) and also then just hoping that the recruit doesn't get hurt while playing in high school watching his stats go and praying his GPA doesn't drop below 2.5 the NCAA cutoff. Also add in those early graduates who should have some offseason progression. So, what do you think?

[Adam_in_SC]

How cool would this game be if they used something similar to Rockstar's LA Noire decision engine where you had multiple options to choose from and each option chosen had a drastic impact on what decision you would have to make next.

I think the best thing I have seen in this tread is the idea of sending a coach out to scout a player and then returning with the info. Maybe you could send each coach on your staff to scout only one player each week and then they returned an evaluation on him such as this is a guy we have to offer, we need to see him again or we need to look elsewhere. Top it off with and by the way I saw this kid as well and we might want to look at him as well.

As someone else said you almost sleep though recruiting. I know that if I just hit X really fast I can finish a session in 30 seconds. I'm really sick of seeing the pitches flash like roulette. Just give me the damn pitch when I hit X and lets save the time.