My contribution to sliders

[milkman41]

Hey guys I just played my first game with these sliders, pretty decent, although the CPU passing game was very very good (could just be them and not the sliders!), which is surprisingly since I have the best CB tandem in the league, and a damn good nickel CB. The deep accuracy was definitely too high, but I think thats just the game. The OL/DL interaction was surprisingly good, actually, as my LE Andre Dalembert finished with 8 hurries and 3 sacks.

Stats (I'm the Jets):
Passing:
Jets QB Anquan Taylor - 17 - 28 (60%), 187 yards, 2 TDs, 3 INTs, 64.7 rating
Seahawks QB Drew Brees - 25 - 35 (71%), 344 yards, 4 TDs, 1 INT, 128.7 rating

Rushing:
Jets HB Antonio Usher: 23 - 129 (5.6 YPC), 1 TD, 1 fumble
Jets HB Bryan Peterson: 7 - 33 (4.7 YPC)
Seahawks HB Marion Barber: 11 - 19 (1.7 YPC). This was just a good effort on the part of my defense, there weren't as many negative runs as usual.

Receiving:
Seahawks WR Roydell Williams: 7 - 107, 1 TD, WR Terrell Owens: 6 - 78, WR Jayson Paisinger - 6 - 72, 3 team drops
Jets TE Marcedes Lewis - 4 - 43, 1 TD, WR Lavernues Coles - 4 - 37, WR Jehuu Bacon 3 - 29, 1 TD, 1 team drop

Defensive:
Jets: RE Andre Dalembert 5 TCK, 4 TFL, 3 sacks, 8 hurries, CB Tyrod Darlin - 6 TCK, 1 INT, Keith Rivers + Kerry Rhodes forced a fumble, 18 team hurries
Seahawks: MLB Lofa Tatupu - 14 TCK, 5 TFL, LOLB Geno Stripling, DE Antonio Stamper - 1 sack each, SS Brian Russell - 2 INT, CB Marcus Trufant 1 INT

I also barely made a field goal from 45 yards out with a kicker with 86 kick power.

Seahawks

[milkman41]

I really like these sliders, my CBs are covering well, the DL-OL interaction looks better, my RBs are running smarter...I even saw my QB elude two rushers on one play and then throw a bullet to a receiver, I was pleasantly surprised.

[ebongreen]

Glad you like'em, milkman; it's a work in progress.

I'm monitoring the stats as I go along, comparing my Packers to the NFL as a whole. I've gotten the number of broken tackles down to a useful/standard amount by comparing LeRon James and Maurice Jones-Drew and tinkering accordingly. Jamarion Bellows and the Giants' Steve Smith serve as like-capable receivers at the moment in CTH and CIT, so I can balance that as well. Two things I've noticed that continue to be WAY out of whack statistically are pancakes for the o-line and defeated blocks for the defense, so I'm going to continue tinkering.

For example, Mario Williams has 73 defeated blocks four games into a season, and there are another nine players with more than 60; Devin Gilbert leads my defense with ... three. I have offensive linemen with more blocks defeated than that; Jamarion Bellows has more than that. That's Just Wrong. And everybody knows about the pancake issue...

My next draft of sliders are as follows:

On offense, QBA, PB, WRC all remain at 40. RBA is currently set to 75, and the big change is moving RunBlock up to 90. I have not yet tested the RunBlock setting, and it may screw up the entire set, so YMMV.

On the defensive side, Awr and KD are still at 40, and INTs are at 50. I'm moving BreakBlock up to 60, and my Tackling slider is at 45. I might tweak KnockDown and Tackling slightly yet, but they're in the right neighborhood.

Hopefully as I increase both the RunBlock effectiveness and the BreakBlock effectiveness, it will preserve the balance & playability while normalizing the stats.

The only other change I've made is purshing the Punt Accuracy of me, not the CPU which remains at 50, to 99. when Shane Lechler of the Packers has four times as many touchbacks as punts-inside-the-20 during a season when his ST coach has Kicker Accuracy, I think there's a glitch between how the program treats user and CPU punters. (His worst previous seasons had a 1-1 ratio.) I may yet boost it to 100.

Naturally, I'll make further updates here as these develop.

[ebongreen]

Just to see what happened, I boosted RunBlock and BreakBlock to 100 each, but the stats didn't change significantly and things got weird.

I worked a mega-talented Packers squad playing a below-average Lions team. When (for the Packers) Selvin Lankford, Patrick Boma, Ron Brown, Trae Harris, and [RT Bowling Green 09] can't get more than one pancakes against a Lions front-four all below Balanced OVR 80, the run block slider won't fix the pancake stats-issue. And if Calais Campbell, Patrick Lopez, Devin Gilbert and Aaron Kampman can't defeat blocks against a Lions O-line the same quality as their DL, the BreakBlock slider won't fix the "Defeated Blocks" stat issue. Somehow, the sliders/accounting for both of those these is FUBAR - and it may be that some pancakes that the OL should have are going into Defeated Blocks instead.

The weird parts are that the Lions OL was able to move the Packers DL, and Patrick Lopez is meant to be The Immovable Object. The other weird part is that run-blocks on the Lions didn't stick properly: as a ball carrier passed the blocked defender, they would routinely shed and pursue into the secondary.

So, more tweaking. I've set RunBlock down to 60 again, and BreakBlock to 50, and will see if I can make sanity return to the gameplay, even if the stats for those who play (rather than sim or supersim) remain seriously screwed up.

The monster squads you can build in the English draft path should be like the Alexandrian army, laying waste to average teams on the ground and in the air, inspiring [imagined digital] fear and terror in the opposing team the moment you appear on their schedule. Seriously - Patrick Boma vs. Kevin Williams should be a battle for the ages twice a year, with Patrick pancaking KW a couple times a game and KW slipping past Patrick every so often to menace [Packers QB]. The sad fact that the OL/DL interaction is so screwed up makes these matchups much less important and much less fun to observe, and less fun to play.

[milkman41]

Yeah the OL/DL interaction isn't all there, but it's still better than before I feel. I saw LE Andre Dalembert (stud) actually power through and split 2 blockers for a sack, and the CPU actually has a running game against me. Seeing a fair number of fumbles and a lot of penalties though...:\

[ebongreen]

My current working slider set:

On offense, QBA, PB, WRC are all 40. RBA is 75. RB is 60.
On defense, AWR and KD are 40. INTs are 50. BB and TK are 45.
On special teams, FGP is 45, and FGA is 40. PPW is 50, and PA is [User 100/CPU 50]. KPW is 40.

Future tweaking: It seems like you need about a 30 point spread between TK and RBA, because TK 40 and RBA 80 led to too many broken tackles. I may yet try RBA 80 and TK 50, but I'm leaving the sliders where they are for the remainder of this franchise's season to see how things pan out.

Defensive AWR is about right; we all know 50 is too smart because it leads to LBs routinely slaughtering halfbacks. I'd be interested to see what sort of results people get +/-5 points, i.e. between 35-45, and I may fiddle with it later.

Similarly, I'd be interested to see what comes from QBA 30-40. Since the AI seems to have no concept of a "touch pass", I'm pretty leery of this change. A lot of the long-ball accuracy should be "get the ball in the vicinity of the receiver and let the WR adjust the route or make a play", but it seems like every pass is a near-perfect bullet or a wide-open miss, and short-range accuracy is *&^%. Slants - slants! - seem much harder to complete than they should be, and the three-step passing game is pretty bad, IMO.

Last, I'm really tempted to futz with the RunBlock/BreakBlock link and move it to 65/50 - again, preserving the 15-point spread which seems to work, but I think that's going to let the defense disengage from run-blockers too easily. Right now, it's at the bottom of my tweak-pile and likely to stay there.

[Mike3207]

Quote: Originally Posted by ebongreen

My current working slider set: On offense, QBA, PB, WRC are all 40. RBA is 75. RB is 60. On defense, AWR and KD are 40. INTs are 50. BB and TK are 45. On special teams, FGP is 45, and FGA is 40. PPW is 50, and PA is [User 100/CPU 50]. KPW is 40. Future tweaking: It seems like you need about a 30 point spread between TK and RBA, because TK 40 and RBA 80 led to too many broken tackles. I may yet try RBA 80 and TK 50, but I'm leaving the sliders where they are for the remainder of this franchise's season to see how things pan out. Defensive AWR is about right; we all know 50 is too smart because it leads to LBs routinely slaughtering halfbacks. I'd be interested to see what sort of results people get +/-5 points, i.e. between 35-45, and I may fiddle with it later. Similarly, I'd be interested to see what comes from QBA 30-40. Since the AI seems to have no concept of a "touch pass", I'm pretty leery of this change. A lot of the long-ball accuracy should be "get the ball in the vicinity of the receiver and let the WR adjust the route or make a play", but it seems like every pass is a near-perfect bullet or a wide-open miss, and short-range accuracy is *&^%. Slants - slants! - seem much harder to complete than they should be, and the three-step passing game is pretty bad, IMO. Last, I'm really tempted to futz with the RunBlock/BreakBlock link and move it to 65/50 - again, preserving the 15-point spread which seems to work, but I think that's going to let the defense disengage from run-blockers too easily. Right now, it's at the bottom of my tweak-pile and likely to stay there.

What sort of stats are you seeing with this current slider set, and have you made any changes?

[ebongreen]

I haven't made any changes to this bunch lately; I'm content with it as is. I've come to terms with the idea that AFAIK no slider set will ever provide the same results for played-games as supersim or simmed games, and I love to call the plays, so my stats are always going to be "off".

I'm also not playing my team "conventionally" as far as player development goes; when a WR or TE reaches about 1000 yards, I drop him in the depth chart in-game and begin throwing to someone else, for example. I use two OLBs rather than in my 4-3 nickel rather than MLB + ROLB as another manual substitution. So my stats shouldn't necessarily be a benchmark for anyone else.

If I played my Packers conventionally, a 5K-yd passer would be commonplace, along with at least three K-yd receivers and a 1.5K-yd halfback. At least two players will reach 10 sacks each year, and at least one player will have 10 picks per year. Getting an offensive lineman in the Pro Bowl remains a struggle and a dream, thanks to bad stats mimicking on-field vs. sim/supersim.

I've almost finished developing my coaching staff, so I expect darn good results, and McCarthy is a coach with a high ceiling. When I get through with this regular season, I'll post a stats sample and you can see how I did.