[JoshC1977]

Hey guys,

Hard to believe, but EA Access is this week for M20!

Now, having played on the Beta, I have a pretty decent feel for how things should play-out on the game. Now, with the ratings stretch, there will be, in theory, more variety. There will be more mis-matches and more tactics involved. Because of this, I think we have to re-evaluate what we consider to be a meaningful sample size. Too many people are going to go haywire in over-reacting to stat-based outliers. I think it will be even more critical to gain a significant sample size prior to considering major changes.

So, this is the current roadmap I will be using for this year:

1. Beta Evaluation. In addition to giving feedback, I used the Beta to assess my general baseline setup. That baseline setup was as follows:

All Pro
10 min Quarter w/ with no acc clock
Injuries at 50 (assigned in main menu and CFM)
All gameplay assists turned off
All other sliders/penalties/XP at default 50

That setup (on the Beta) played a pretty darn balanced, fun, and challenging game.

2. EA Access evaluation. I will use that baseline setup and will do some careful review of the gameplay. My main focus will be looking for any signs of threshold imbalance. The default threshold in the beta looked solid enough, but this is one area I want to be sure we're good on. If necessary, I'll do some tinkering here.

3. Launch Day. Unless there are significant issues uncovered during the EA Access trial, I will have a setup posted in a new thread for launch day. Then I will be playing through at least THREE full seasons and assessing information there before deciding if further changes are needed.