Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Is anyone else noticing it's back? It's been really bad for me lately. I can have a guy beat and no matter what the situation somehow either he or another defender will warp, go super fast and slide in front of me to contest. Rarely when I beat a guy and they don't get in front of me they somehow warp into me from behind and strip the ball as I attempt to shoot. It's with all types of rosters and sliders. It's as bad as 2K24 was and the game didn't ship like this.

It's not like it's occasional or even a fair amount of the time. It's pretty much every single possession.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

This is why I switched to all star

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

It's probably the ratings and badges. I haven't noticed any skating when players are just moving around, but when certain animations are triggered due to the game calculating ratings and defining an outcome, that's when the warping and skating happens. The guy stripping the ball probably has a very high steal rating. This will be more noticeable on higher difficulties, as Sirjam pointed out.

The tech just hasn't reached the level where we can eat our cake and have it too, that is, have perfect foot planting AND have the game respect ratings and make them matter.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

I wonder how much the Eras hand-checking rule plays into this. Always wondered what the tangible in-game effect of that rule was.

Especially since the original NBA 2K came out in 1999, just after the real NBA changed the rules to end it (and actually enforced it).

Lest we forget, some of the code in 2K25 dates all the way back to that original game.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Aside from it being an eyesore and just plain unrealistic looking, it's also bad for the CPU most of the time because regardless of the players or situation it happens, and without any regard for context it pretty much puts their player in foul trouble.

I tried an experiment, as I am really frustrated with it, to see what ratings and/or tendencies affect it. I brought Jalen Brunson's defensive ratings and tendencies down to 25 (he's always sliding in front of me and defending everything like an animal) and from what I can tell there is definitely some fishy stuff going on. He's one of the biggest culprits and despite the changes he still did everything, but to a lesser degree. Not that much less, however. He's basically hard coded to be an absolute savage defensively. He hard fouls, he slides and warps and contests nearly everything. He does it against all stars and 12th men alike regardless of the situation.

Unfortunately the best solution I've found is to lower inside and driving contact to 0, but that's just an awful alternative. I really wish 2K would do a better job of this stuff. It looks terrible and feels worse knowing that the guy a step behind you is going to somehow get in front of you defying the laws of physics. And, at least in my opinion, it's way worse than it was upon release.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

I feel you bro. It's the last frontier for 2K to get proper foot planting right on defense. The 1st thing i do every year is lower On-Ball defense to 0. I also lower Body Up Sensitivity & Agility (used to be Lateral Quickness). Doing this doesn't eliminate sliding, but it definitely helps with the issues you mentioned.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Yeah, I still don't understand their defensive philosophy of every defender being pretty much a robot. Seeing guys sprint down the court, no idea of what's going on 50 feet behind them, turn around and contort in a way that would splinter their legs, just to run 10x faster than anyone else on the court directly to where the pass is going to land was old 15 years ago. It's beyond terrible now, but the sliding and warping to contest is just plain ridiculous. I find it as bad as last year now and it wasn't like this upon release.

I'm going to try All Star I guess. I have turned off my last 12 or so games because I can't stand seeing the guy behind me somehow, magically, end up in front of me, defying physics.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

It’s insane the way they program the a.I to have esp in the year 2024. It’s not old gen anymore

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Yeah, it's pretty awful. It's a shame too because when it was released it wasn't that bad at all. Psychic defenders and sliding/warping ruined 24 for me and it just ruined 25 also. You can look on Youtube and watch gameplay from a month ago and you can see plain as day defenders acting like human beings most of the time, as opposed to this garbage.

I'm sure it's to make online play better, which is cool...I get it. Gotta make their money. I can't wait until they either fire whomever thinks physics doesn't matter and thinks psychic defenders is a good idea or they change it so that defenders react and move like actual human beings. I have a feeling I'll be waiting a very long time.

At least there's practice mode where I can marvel at the options I'd be able to do someday if things change.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Given that dribbling has truly seemed to been “built from the ground up” it gives me hope that defensive on ball and off ball movement can receive the same treatment in time

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Bro! I’m glad it’s not just me. Some could argue before it was a little easy to get to the cup before, but it FELT right. There weren’t as many missed layups before just because a defender was in the vicinity. I’ve had open lanes to the rim that looked like a clear dunk, but because a defender was 5ft away, it turns into a contact layup. It wasn’t like this at launch.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Yeah, it's awful. Some of the stuff I'm seeing is absolutely bonkos. Forced contact animations, crazy suction and warping. Every defender is way, way better than they should be and can recover and react literally 1 for 1 vs my input. I'm done with it until the patch. If it's not fixed by then, I'll just quit, unfortunately.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Me too just like last year and the year before that. And basketball is my sport. Smh every year

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Had some decent games with the CoTY rosters as they have done some really cool thing with ratings and badges. Essentially nobody has good defensive ratings and it was going really well. Then there was an update 2 days ago. Now that roster plays like HoF defenders with max ratings.

Daily updates blow. I uninstalled the game. I think it's pure and utter garbage. Turbo barely works now. I get odd hitch animations when trying to go around a screen, usually just enough to make it so that some defender can slide through the other players. The list is pretty much endless now in regards to how offensive players are neutered when playing against the cpu. I uninstalled because somehow I avoided all contact going around a screen - nothing but air between me and the rim. For no reason at all my guy just does this odd in and out into a hesi which brought him to practically a dead stop. Fighting through magical forcefields to try and go fast, moves/animations I didn't do, defenders that warp 6 feet just to flagrant foul you, etc. I literally haven't had a layup in about 3 days where at least 2 guys don't warp from behind me and try to piledrive me through the floor.

I'm hoping that a fresh install can possibly help, but I'm not too optimistic. The fundamental defense coding is just plain awful. Can't believe I'm actually playing 2K24 now waiting to see if the fresh install helps. Up until recently 24 was what I considered an all time, world class bad game...and it's legit better than 25 imo.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Such a shame because some things in 2k25 are actually pretty good. I find the overall tone, lighting and shading really good, the controls are decent, I can finally turn off HUD elements like the ugly *** line at the bottom or make the circles smaller.

But these things and many others just ruin it, Ive not bought 2k in a long time, tried 2k25 last night and refunded within the 2 hour window. Among many bugs, this warping and odd behaviour is really annoying, i had AI receiving a pass and suddenly noticed his arm lightning warped to the back a bit like it was detached from his body just so he could reach the ball. Jumpers being contested when the defender arrives 3 seconds after the jumper is jumped, etc.

On top of this, I get a main female ref every 2nd game, no offense but is it so many of them in NBA? The whole presentation is odd. And dont get me started on compiling shaders for half hour and when its finished, it compiles additional shaders. On PC they also removed exclusive fullscreen for some dumb ****ing reason which is rediculous for a sports game where input lag is so important.

I went back to my favourite 2k19 and that game is still amazing, works great, controls are responsive and I rarely get odd behaviour.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

There are several elements creating those very bad animations and behaviour from the AI, we fixed everything within our Roster (CoY Roster) and I’ll share you some insights below:

# Where do Defensive suctions come from ?

- Attributes : strength has the same impact as perimeter defense on defensive suctions animations. High values here will generate more suctions.
- Sliders : body up sensitivity helps to reduce it, but once strength and perimeter defense are well calibrated.
- Badges : remove all defensive badges as high values in attributes strength and PD will already create a huge amount of defensive suctions.

# Defensive sliding animations ?

- Sliders : defense strength takeoff and gather (layup and jump shot) must be below 30 to avoid any sliding animations.
- Help defense strenght must be at max 50 otherwise help defence is unrealistic with sliding animations

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

As I mentioned earlier I used your rosters and had some great games. I decided I'd likely use your rosters for the year. For no good reason at all after a daily update your rosters started performing like out of the box rosters. Sliding and warping. Crazy aggressive defense. Psychic defenders at all skill levels, ratings etc. I tried the game a couple of days ago after the fresh install, disconnected from the internet entirely and same thing. Just baffled.

Then yesterday happened. Resigned to having to completely mess with sliders sooooo much that I'd just spend a few days at it and maybe get a working game (for my taste) for the upcoming holiday season I played a game to get a base for what I need to do again, as I have been away from it for a couple of days and much to my surprise the ridiculous overly physical crap is gone. There is still some sliding and warping, but it's not literally every single time I try to dunk or lay it up. The primary issue now is that there's absolutely no weight to players. Everyone seems like they are on roller skates. That's not a roster issue. I find it just kinda happens.

There are so many arbitrary things with this game, and it's beyond fixing from roster edits and sliders alone. It's coding and it's baked in. I don't have a great way to articulate what I am seeing other than despite not being online, regardless of sliders and roster edits, the game has what I'd call modes, and of which I believe there are 3. The first being normal. Sliders and roster edits have a big impact. Players have weight, button input (turbo especially) actually work pretty well. Sure, there are issues, but you'll see pretty tangible differences when you use different rosters, sliders, etc. The second mode is what I call 'War Mode/WWE/Pure And Utter Garbage Mode'. Unplayable, useless garbage. Every defender is an absolute legend. Every single possession on both sides of the ball you see players just completely ignore physics. It's ridiculous. Defenders behind you will almost always somehow get in front of you before you get your drive attempt off. It's just pure arcade madness. Most of the time in this mode players have weight and it feels good but button input/responsiveness is very suspect. Half the time turbo barely works or you'll do all sorts of odd animations before you do what you want etc. The third 'mode' is an exact copy of the 'normal mode' but players have no real weight and it seems like the court is an ice rink instead of hardwood. If you are like me and unfortunately get stuck in a 'mode' you do not like, my only suggestion is to literally just keep switching roster and slider sets mid game while offline. Online just doesn't seem to work.

Yesterday I learned there is possibly hope for us sim guys. I watched a Youtube guy who's pretty popular in the online community, Badgeplug. He makes a fair amount of 2K content. I'll admit I have no desire to play online, so I only use his content as a resource to maybe gauge what could happen for the game because as we all know the game is adjusted by what the online community demands. I say all that to say he, and others, have been very vocal about how warping and sliding is a huge issue online. Making offensive play seem pretty neutered. Apparently it was an issue for a popular streamer in some big event or content video and now it's a top priority for some of that crowd to get fixed, so if they all kick and scream about it, there is at least a chance 2K try and fix it. Obviously it's just bad coding and/or understanding of basketball and physics, but I'm pretty sure they have some people there that can fix it, and once/if they do, I will never go online again, because I have no doubt they will over correct it and legend badge on ball pest will be useless and then they'll be more adjustments, then more after that, then more, etc.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

I feel you, and the worst being that they do frequent gameplay update based on online comments which overall, make the gameplay unstable and inconsistent for offline players.

Feel free to join our discord to share your thoughts because plenty of users are helping to identify issues and share solutions.

Re: Defensive Suction, Sliding and Warping
 

Appreciate your rosters!!