View Single Post
Old 07-10-2019, 04:40 PM   #2
TylerHL
Rookie
 
TylerHL's Arena
 
OVR: 0
Join Date: Jul 2014
Location: GA
Re: Best NCAA Football Sim Engine?

Personally I think NCAA 12 is great for this. I had the same attitude towards NCAA 14 and it was part of one of the reasons why I switched back. I played through an 8 season dynasty before starting a new one to report on the dynasty forums and I was really happy with the simulation stats and results each year. I'll just give you my experiences (pos/neg) with it.

Positives:
Upsets are more rare, and when they do happen, they don't seem to be as totally ridiculous (i.e. an unranked Iowa may beat a #1 Ohio State at home rather than Akron beating a #1 Ohio State in the horsehoe or something like that).

I've found that simulated in-game stats are heavily correlated with coaching profiles (editable in dynasty) and player ratings (also editable in dynasty).

Depending on where you set the play-call tendency slider and the playbook the coach runs, the stats will heavily reflect that.

Coaches that run air raid offenses on a high passing slider with good quarterbacks and receivers (i.e. 2011 Houston with 94 rated Case Keenum and two high 80s receivers) will always be among the league leaders in every passing/receiving statistic. Run heavy offenses (pistol, option) will typically be among the rushing leaders once again depending on how good the running back is and also where the coaches substitution slider is at.

Tendencies do matter (can be edited). Quarterbacks with a Scrambler tendency will always put up solid rushing yards in simulations and, depending how good they are, will end with 500-1300 rush yards a season. Those with Pocket Passer tendency will have less than 100 rushing yards or into the negatives, and Balanced quarterbacks will be somewhere in-between.

Negatives:
If a player gets injured (especially at running-back) the games simulation engine doesn't move further down the depth chart to substitute for some reason. For example if the #1 running-back goes down in week 1 with a season ending injury, instead of him splitting carries with the #2 for the rest of the season, the #2 will now get twice the work instead of sharing more of it with the #3. Usually this isn't glaringly obvious, but I've seen where a backup ends the season with almost 100 more carries than anyone else in the NCAA because of this.

Blowout games can also get weird. Like if it's Alabama vs an FCS team, you'd expect the #1 RB to have a monster game, but it's almost always the second stringers that end up with it. I think the engine automatically has a mass-sub option built in and because these games are usually blowouts so early, the second string will end up with 28 carries for 262 yards and 4 rushing TD, while the Heisman front runner #1 will end with 8 carries for 52 yards and a TD.

Defensive simulation stats don't make as much sense as offensive. There isn't as much of an obvious gap between player ratings and results. Sometimes the most highly rated guys will have the best stats and win the awards, but almost just as often a 70 something overall who had a big season will be up there as well.
TylerHL is offline  
Reply With Quote