Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

[hurricanefootball4]

The addition of fatigue to the gameplay of NCAA Football 14 will make team depth more important than ever. No longer will you be able to run no huddle offense and mash on the sprint with the same players all game long.

This will add an element of strategy to the game that has been largely absent in previous version. It will matter how many formation packages your starting running back is in, how many snaps he gets, and whether or not you want to have him run back kicks on special teams.

This also amplifies the importance of team depth, which naturally ties into the total number of players the game will allow you to roster.

In real life NCAA Football teams are allowed to have 105 man rosters, 85 of which can be on scholarship. Currently, NCAA Football the game allows you to roster only 70 players (a full 35 less than in real life). While I understand not accounting for the 20 available spots for walk-ons, having the full 85 man scholarship number has become a necessity for realism which will only be amplified by the addition of realistic fatigue.

Currently, a lot of players that would be redshirted in real life you have to cut in NCAA Football the game due to the roster limitations. A big part of coaching is looking 2-3 years down the road and that freshman that you had to cut might not have made a difference now, but would have made a difference in the future. Coaching college football is as much about roster management and development as it is about X's and O's.

I hold out hope that 85 man rosters has made it into NCAA Football 14, but if not I want to continue to stress why this is important for a realistic football game. This is also an issue that impacts all teams in the game, and not something that only impacts one team (uniform, stadium, entrance, etc).

What do you think about the importance of 85 man rosters and why? Will realistic fatigue change how you manage your roster?

[Ice_Cold345]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

I hope it does, because I love that it makes having a deep team actually a good thing, because teams will often be called "deep" and usually are good (granted that's normally in basketball but it can apply to football.) It makes you want to spread the ball around when passing (which I already do, I rarely have 8+ reception guys) and running becomes more strategic in having a two or three back system. It also lends a hand to more of a chance to see a "Smash and Dash" attack that hopefully the Force Impact helps with along with the fatigue.

[TajDeni]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

honest question.

since starters barely come out the game now; why couldnt this be accomplished with the current 70 man roster.

i know 85 is accurate to real life, however dont you find that folks are already over-recruiting?

in ncaa12, after i won a national championship, my backups backups were in the high 70's to 80's and they were most likely freshman.

so if the games goes to 85-man roster; do you have any addition suggestions to offset over-recruiting? or having 3+ layers of 80-rated players?

[Bamanutt]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

honest question.

since starters barely come out the game now; why couldnt this be accomplished with the current 70 man roster.

i know 85 is accurate to real life, however dont you find that folks are already over-recruiting?

in ncaa12, after i won a national championship, my backups backups were in the high 70's to 80's and they were most likely freshman.

so if the games goes to 85-man roster; do you have any addition suggestions to offset over-recruiting? or having 3+ layers of 80-rated players?

Good question IMO, but the simple & hard answer is making attributes matter, & reducing the overall number of elite level prospects. Year to year progression has to work effectively. I mean it's rare that a 4-5* recruit will come in & start & have a major impact over a senior 3 year starter even if that starter was a 3* when recruited. He has 3 years with the playbook(unless coaches changed or playbook changed) plus 3 years of college weight & nutrition programs that will most likely in all but the rarest of cases put that lower rated player ahead of the stud recruit. Details like these need to be fixed &BALANCED so that we can fully appreciate the 85 man roster.

FYI, I'd so love it if a walk on made it & had an impact at say BAMA,LSU,USC, or any other major program & the game not only was aware but the announcers & newspaper reports gushed over it. When these types of details are in our games, we will be alot closer to having the NCAA football game I think we want. Jmo

[Bamanutt]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

honest question.

since starters barely come out the game now; why couldnt this be accomplished with the current 70 man roster.

i know 85 is accurate to real life, however dont you find that folks are already over-recruiting?

in ncaa12, after i won a national championship, my backups backups were in the high 70's to 80's and they were most likely freshman.

so if the games goes to 85-man roster; do you have any addition suggestions to offset over-recruiting? or having 3+ layers of 80-rated players?

Also fatigue has to be game wide, not just skill players that we mash "turbo" on.
Rarely do o-linemen or d-linemen play every single snap & never do the back ups play exactly like the starters. Drop off is a must between 1 st & 2nd stringers. ( it adds to the strategy of the game--coaching)

[WFColonel56]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

Also fatigue has to be game wide, not just skill players that we mash "turbo" on.
Rarely do o-linemen or d-linemen play every single snap & never do the back ups play exactly like the starters. Drop off is a must between 1 st & 2nd stringers. ( it adds to the strategy of the game--coaching)

This is false (well partially). OL usually plays every snap unless its a blowout.

[BA2929]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

This is false (well partially). OL usually plays every snap unless its a blowout.

Yes, I've rarely seen a relatively close game where they take out anyone on the offensive line.

[hurricanefootball4]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

You bring up a couple of good points so I want to make sure that I address them

i know 85 is accurate to real life, however dont you find that folks are already over-recruiting?

I'm assuming that you're talking about over recruiting in game in NCAA Football. Only allowing us to roster 70 players actually encourages people to over recruit because you can't redshirt someone and let them take the time to develop. Because of the roster limitation you end up cutting someone you would otherwise keep. It's common for people to recruit 3 people of the same position knowing they will only keep 1 or 2 of them and just cutting the others.

in ncaa12, after i won a national championship, my backups backups were in the high 70's to 80's and they were most likely freshman.

A key point to note here is that this is far less noticeable issue with a team that already has a high talent level and has the prestige to continue to bring in game-ready recruits. For instance, I've never really had an issue when playing as Miami because I can always recruit 70-80 overall game-ready players. The issues are when you have a 1-3 star program and really have to rely on redshirting and development over 3 years. In real life teams like Boise State stay competitive by recruiting 2 and 3 star guys, redshirting them, and then they see the field when they are a redshirt junior or senior. They know they can't compete with Alabama for the game-ready freshman, so they don't try to. It's difficult to do this in the game because of the roster limitation.

so if the games goes to 85-man roster; do you have any addition suggestions to offset over-recruiting? or having 3+ layers of 80-rated players?

It would be relatively easy to implement some ways to stop over recruiting, here is how I personally would do it:

• In place of the "25" limit the number would show your number out of 85, so if you had 15 outgoing guys your number would be 70/85. If you had 25 outgoing seniors it would show 60/85.
• Some years your recruting classes would be bigger, some years they would be smaller - just like in real life
• You would be allowed to sign over 85, but your coach prestige/trust/promise factor would take a hit every time you cut someone.

Early entries and transfers would take place at the same time they do currently in NCAA Football and you would know then if you could add more guys to your class or not.

[hurricanefootball4]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

I agree on the fatigue being a factor for the offensive and defensive line, and it would definitely add an element of strategy.

The Chicago Bears only played Julius Peppers on 60-70% of snaps this season because they viewed fresh bodies as more important than talent level disparity. Peppers also played better because every time he came in he was fresh.

This would make tweaking your auto subs important as to what the threshold would be.

[Bamanutt]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

This is false (well partially). OL usually plays every snap unless its a blowout.

Across a 12-15 game season I would say that the same 5 linemen starting the season playing every minute of every game never, has ever finished the season. That's the level of detail that is needed to take advantage of the 85 man roster.

[hurricanefootball4]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

Across a 12-15 game season I would say that the same 5 linemen starting the season playing every minute of every game never, has ever finished the season. That's the level of detail that is needed to take advantage of the 85 man roster.

The subbing of offensive lineman goes largely unnoticed because their names aren't being called unless they commit a penalty or a monster block. As you have pointed out, offensive lineman are subbed in and out of the game (even for a play or two) regularly throughout the game.

[Big FN Deal]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

I am all for accuracy so if the game can be expanded to include a 85 man roster I am all for it. However, I voted for "no difference" because for one, since every team is restricted to 70 players, it's relative and secondly because fatigue alone isn't enough to represent the importance of team depth. Meaning, in real college football, is not just about being able to field up to 85 athletes but about being able to field the highest number of skilled athletes. So a team like Alabama is "deep" while ECU is not because Bama has second and some third string players that are skilled enough to theoretically start at many other schools, where as ECU may have a skilled 1st string but a skill drop off for the latter strings.

So while fatigue should clearly matter in NCAA 14, causing each team to utilize their depth more and play more players, there needs to be a much better representation of the differential in skill for each player, to showcase deep teams. Hopefully the "real AI" being touted will help that because currently even the elite/star players in the game, don't perform that way under CPU control, which the majority of the players are under CPU control when playing. If real AI can start to truly differentiate player skill under CPU control, more than just the speed rating would be paramount, then couple that with fatigue causing potentially lesser skilled players to play and we just might have something good.

That said, this will be the first year for both real AI and fatigue so I don't expect either one to be done that great.

[BA2929]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

Across a 12-15 game season I would say that the same 5 linemen starting the season playing every minute of every game never, has ever finished the season. That's the level of detail that is needed to take advantage of the 85 man roster.

Most of the time that's due to injury though. I highly doubt TAM took Luke Joeckel out of close games because he was tired. He started all 38 games while there, and I doubt he came out of many due to fatigue.

If EA is going to make us sub OL guys due to the new fatigue system, then they better have a good plan on how to implement it because I don't want my 99 overall LT coming out of the game in the 3rd Q for 4 plays because he's tired. Heck, I don't want my 77 overall RT coming out of a close game because he's tired.

The subbing of offensive lineman goes largely unnoticed because their names aren't being called unless they commit a penalty or a monster block. As you have pointed out, offensive lineman are subbed in and out of the game (even for a play or two) regularly throughout the game.

I don't believe this is true. I don't think I've EVER seen a starting lineman come out of a game due to fatigue. Especially a Center or LT. That'd be quite a big deal if there was a bad snap and it was because the Center was out due to being tired and not injury.

[Big FN Deal]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

Across a 12-15 game season I would say that the same 5 linemen starting the season playing every minute of every game never, has ever finished the season. That's the level of detail that is needed to take advantage of the 85 man roster.

True but that's more about injury and chemistry than fatigue. I hope with all this new IE talk there is something new on the injury system, like real time injuries but who knows. Also, like I stated earlier, OL are always under CPU control so the real AI could be a big factor here, if Tiburon ever chooses to focus on the importance of finding good chemistry in the trenches and on teams in general.

It's much too easy to just find the highest rated OL you can, plug them in and forget about them. That's of course not how it is with a real OLine and sometimes it takes time to find the right unit and when they do, why it's so potentially challenging if there are injuries or other changes needed to that unit.

[BA2929]

Re: Why Realistic Fatigue Makes 85 Man Rosters Even More Important

True but that's more about injury and chemistry than fatigue. I hope with all this new IE talk there is something new on the injury system, like real time injuries but who knows. Also, like I stated earlier, OL are always under CPU control so the real AI could be a big factor here, if Tiburon ever chooses to focus on the importance of finding good chemistry in the trenches and on teams in general.

It's much too easy to just find the highest rated OL you can, plug them in and forget about them. That's of course not how it is with a real OLine and sometimes it takes time to find the right unit and when they do, why it's so potentially challenging if there are injuries or other changes needed to that unit.

Agreed. I wouldn't mind a few OL injuries. I don't think I've seen an injury to anyone on my OL or DL in probably 7 years of NCAA Football. Plus (getting back on topic here), it'd be nice to be able to keep more than 1, maybe 2, backups for each OL position. With 85 man rosters you could really groom your lines.