Regression. WTF EA?
 

"With age comes wisdom, but sometimes age comes alone" - Oscar Wilde

I think someone at EA took this quote a little TOO seriously.

I see why so many people say Regression is broken.

3 Key Instances:

DeMario Davis at end of 2018 Season(85 OVR):
2nd in Team in Tackles
1st in TFL
2nd in INT(5)
3rd in PBU
5th in Sacks(6)

-6 PRC
-6 AWR
-2 Speed
-1 BSH
-1 Str
-2 Tak
-3 POW
-1 FMV
-2 PMW
-1 ACC

77 OVR

Patrick Robinson at end of 2018 Season *IR*(81 OVR):
-5 AWR
-5 PRC
-2 Spd
-1 ACC
-1 MCV & ZCV
-1 Tak
-1 Prs

78 OVR

Max Unger at end of 2018 season(85 OVR):
-2 sacks allowed
-5 pancakes

-7 AWR
-1 Str
-2 spd
-1 Acc

78 OVR

Anyone see the issue there?

Players should definitely not lose Awareness and Play Recognition with age because with age comes experience and those 2 stats are especially experience driven.

"But you can manually go in and change their ratings, duh"
I did, I shouldn't have to do that. I'm basically fixing their game for them.

I also don't understand why there isn't any natural progression either. I haven't seen any evidence of it yet. I appreciate Madden putting all progression into my hands, no doubt, but that makes having practice squad players and young depth guys pointless because they don't naturally progress at the end of the year.

NCAA 14 progressed guys naturally because despite not playing they still participate in practice, watch film, and watch games, workout, etc.. They naturally progress. It's a basic concept that's missing in Madden 19

"They still gain XP in the background tho"
I progressed maybe 3 young depth guys through my whole 2018 season as the Saints. Also going undefeated in that season and winning the superbowl on All Madden(woop woop :waytogo:)

(if there is natural progression please let me know so I can delete that portion)

Re: Regression. WTF EA?
 

Their formulas are definitely broken. They claimed to have assigned random archetypes to players in the background where some will regress early and some will take forever to regress, but in my experience once you hit 29 you're going to start dropping ratings very quickly.

Re: Regression. WTF EA?
 

It has to be a mistake on their part. I don't mind bashing Madden, but this honestly seems like an oversight.

Re: Regression. WTF EA?
 

You have to remove Awareness and Play rec if you want their OVR's to degrade due to the way the OVR formulas are built.

The NCAA reference isn't quite the same because you only had to account for a player for four years. That's where a lot of this stuff comes apart is how do you balance guys staying around for somewhat long periods of times? If they all just naturally progressed you'd have an unbalanced game so many years in.

The thing is nothing ever really "naturally" progressed before it was simply hidden. They exposed some of what was happening in the back end when they moved to CFM and people acted like it was a total revamp. It was actually similar to what is happening now with the CPU making the decisions of where to spend said xp.

It still needs work but has gotten better over the last couple years. As to the change this year, it is about a chance they don't regress as much. There is now a dice roll determining regression with an age modifier that makes it more likely to regress as you get older but you can "win" and not regress or regress very little to try and get closer to some of the older players we see now that are still top talents.

Re: Regression. WTF EA?
 

There's an assumed false equivalence in the OP between Awareness / Play Recognition and "intelligence", which isn't necessarily correct. Those two things more better represent spatial awareness and reaction time, both of which do deteriorate as a human ages. They don't necessarily represent intelligence.

Madden has no concept of an athlete's overall intelligence. There's nothing in the game which governs an athlete's ability to absorb a playbook, for example. Almost any decision-making / functional intelligence traits an athlete does possess are often governed - at least in part if not entirely - by more specific ratings or traits (ex. Ball Carrier Vision, Zone Coverage, Senses Pressure trait). A notable exception is for offensive linemen, where AWR governs the CPU-controlled functions of the ID The Mike feature.

In any event, my understanding is that the function of the AWR rating is decreasing as time goes on; it was replaced by PRC on defense by-and-large, for example. It might be weighted too highly in the OVR formula?

Re: Regression. WTF EA?
 

Exactly as CM Hooe said, Awr and Prc don't have the gameplay effect their names give.

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Re: Regression. WTF EA?
 

But regardless of what those ratings mean, people shouldnt regress so drastically after great years in my opinion.

Regression. WTF EA?
 

CM makes an interesting point, but I believe its simpler than that. Previous Madden games factored physical depreciation more heavily as players aged; however, the community complained, rightfully, that players don’t become much slower or weaker as they age - there is data to support this, but I don’t have it readily available.

Now, in Madden 19, physical attributes are less impacted, and intangible ratings take a bigger percentage of the depreciation. Neither approach is realistic, but there has to be a way for older players to phase out of the league and new players take their place.

I have always subscribed that fatigue and injury ratings should regress to the point that older players aren’t worth the roster spot due to their limitations - which is much closer to the reason that most players finally exit the league (injury or ability to overcome accrued fatigue).




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