How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

I'm interested in hearing how throughout the course of a CFM, you guys try to keep things "Sim" for yourself. Share what difficulty, sliders, quarter length, house rules, and/or general management tactics you use to try to keep things realistic for yourself. Although this can apply to online leagues, I'm really interested in how solo CFM players do things.

I personally this year have been mostly using All-Madden adjusted sliders with 10 minute quarters and a runoff to 20 seconds on the play clock. (Though, I still wish I could play on All-Pro. Just feels better but I win too much). As for management tactics I don't abuse the trading system. Even when I re-tool my team after my core runs through I still only make two to three trades. I try not to abuse trading at the draft. Maybe one or two trades a year of picks at the draft. I don't low-ball QB contracts or sign every top free agent. I usually look for value veterans for depth where I have needs and build by drafting. I do try to run a variety of plays, use a balanced attack, etc. On All-Madden though, it's hard not to end up playing"the game" on defense rather than playing football when trying to stop the CPU. This approach has worked well for me this year and I've gotten fairly deep into franchise.


What's your take?

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Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

These are SECONDARY things I do:


I started with raising Jimmy G’s contract to the exact value in real life, complete with the 27.5 per year salary.

Then, I go back and forth between: playing on 15 minute quarters with a really low clock runoff stop (like 12 seconds) so that the CPU gets a long enough time of possession to balance out play call differential (instead of me running 75 plays and then 50, it brings it closer to 60/60); and playing on 12 minutes with about 17-20.


These are the PRIMARY things I do :
*Play on All Madden to maximize how the CPU does things like disguising coverages, and just for challenge.

*Tweak sliders so that the gameplay actually LOOKS as close to real NFL football as possible.


*Very rarely adjust player ratings or traits. For example, no NFL back or wr does six spin moves in a row, so every now and then I tweek those ratings down. Another example: Richard Sherman isn’t going to get owned in press coverage by a 4th string WR, and Joe Staley isnt going to be consistently beat by practice squad fodder.

Likewise, Arik Armstead isn’t going to get 15 sacks per season, so I LOWER his ratings or adjust sliders to make it HARDER for me to get sacks with him.

So I adjust sliders or their ratings to compensate for that lack of realism.


In addition, I mix up my play calling as realistically as possible. Since I usually play as the to 49ers, I use play and play call strategies I’ve seen Kyle Shanahan use since his days with the Texans and Browns.






With these things combine, I get something that is challenging and requires concentration and execution to win (and still results in losses), yet looks as close to NFL football as I have seen from Madden in YEARS, if ever.

Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

I would watch your accelerated clock. I dont think the cpu will audible if its under 20 seconds.

Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

Would you suggest a runoff to 25 seconds then?

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Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

I would suggest using atleast 20 and nothing below

Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

I've been at 20, and have been noticing my offensive stats are near the bottom of the league while defense is the opposite almost every year. Should I go with a higher number to get more offensive plays per side?

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Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

Its up to you to be honest. The number of plays doesn't bother me. So many other factors are going to skew that number game to game. As long as the gameplay is legit on the feild im good. I think Madden is the worst when it comes to comparing real life numbers with in game numbers. The devs play on 5-6 min qtrs so...

Re: How You Attempt to Play Sim
 

I throw over the top of your coverage any time your deep shell is not sound against the play I've called. If you cover up the deep routes then I'm going to dink and dunk you to death all the way down the field.

I can play multiple coverage shells out of the same blitz (Crossfire blitzes are the best for this, but there are others that work well). You can bait a ton of INTs with quick pressure plus a timely hot routed cloud flat on the outside.

I can play any of the base coverages in the game (cov 1-4 and 6) while giving an identical (show 2) look pre-snap out of the 3-4 Under. If you have a strong front seven, at the right positions, this is probably the best base D in the game.

Also on defense you can create some fairly realistic pattern matching concepts out of hot routed zones. This takes some practice in both learning and making adjustments and learning opponent tendencies. Playbook knowledge is also vital. It's critical to know exactly what OP route(s) you are up against. If your defensive user is not so great (like mine) you have to go to some lengths to shut down certain routes, but it's very gratifying to see a crossing route your opponent has hit all game get shut down because you were able to rig a hook curl to carry him between the numbers until he could be passed off to the secondary on the other side of the field.