The "Shot Defense Strength" Sliders Explained

[EccentricMeat]

I've FINALLY decided to jump in to 2K19 after putting it off all year, and there was no better place for me to start than right here! The Defense Strength sliders play such a monumental, pivotal role in how games play out on both offense AND defense, so it only makes sense that I finally put in the work required to help better explain just how in the hell these sliders actually work.


WHO DO THE USER/CPU SLIDERS AFFECT? - UPDATED MAY 3RD


Luckily for me the foundation of these settings has stayed the same throughout the years: The Layup/Jump Shot Defense Strength sliders affect the defense AGAINST whoever they're listed under.

For example, set the USER sliders to 100 and the CPU sliders to 0, and the CPU will play fantastic defense AGAINST the USER, while the USER's defense will have very little effect on the CPU. If you want the USER AI to play better defense, you need to increase the CPU Defense Strength sliders, and vice versa.


Now that we have the basics out of the way, it's time to really dive in so I can give you a detailed description of the exact affects each individual slider has on gameplay/animations, and how these sliders work together to give the final result. My aim is to be descriptive enough so that EVERYONE can tweak each individual setting to get the exact gameplay they want based off personal preference and skill level.


SHOT SUCCESS + CONTEXT-BASED ANIMATIONS - UPDATED MAY 3RD


Shot Success

The most obvious affect the Defense Strength sliders have on gameplay is controlling how much the defense affects shot success. As you would assume, the higher you set your Defense Strength sliders, the more the defense will affect shot success. You can better fine-tune this affect to match your own personal preferences and skill level thanks to the sliders being split into two values: 1) Takeoff (for Layups) or Gather (for Jump Shots), and 2) Release.

To put it simply, the Takeoff/Gather sliders control how much just having a defender nearby at the start of a layup/shot will lower the success rate. With a high Takeoff/Gather slider, the defender doesn't need to actually contest the shot to lower it's success rate, he just needs to be nearby and that will be enough. The Release sliders, on the other hand, control how much a defender actively contesting a layup/shot at release will lower the success rate. With Release set to 0, a defender can be in an animation where they are heavily contesting a shot but the game will still register that the shot was "Lightly Contested", while setting the Release sliders to 100 means a defender contesting the shot will severely lower the shot success rate. As an added bonus, a higher Release slider will result in more blocks as the shot contest will give a better animation and actually influence the trajectory of the ball when applicable.


Context-Based Animations

The main reason I'm always so interested in "perfecting" the Defense Strength sliders is due to how much of an affect these sliders have on triggering specific animations. Without the players on the court physically interacting with each other via context-based animations, the game can quickly start to look and feel extremely artificial. I can't count how many times I've watched a nice dunk or layup replay back and noticed that the game essentially ignored that a defender was in the way or was contesting a shot, as it chose to trigger a layup/dunk animation that glides the defender out of the way instead of making the ball-handler and the defender interact with one another. The more often you see this, the more you can't STOP seeing it and the authenticity of the gameplay simply unravels. Luckily for us, that's where the Defense Strength sliders come in handy.

As you increase each Defense Strength slider, more context-based animations will trigger in accordance with that slider. For example:

- The higher you set Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff), more animations will trigger between the dribbler and the defender once the dribbler starts a layup/dunk attempt. Instead of the defender being glided out of the way, you'll see the defender's positioning change which layup animation is triggered so the two players will actually interact in the same animation.
- The higher you set Layup Defense Strength (Release), more animations will trigger between the dribbler and the defender once the dribbler jumps to finish the layup/dunk. Instead of the defender swatting at air as their layup contest is ignored, you'll see the dribbler actually respond to the defender as the two share a context-based animation.


Defensive Positioning and Aggressiveness

On top of getting better/more context-based animations to trigger with higher Defense Strength settings, you will also see defenders be more aggressive and better positioned based off the applicable setting. For example:

- The higher you set Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff), defenders will be more aggressive in attempting to contest when a dribbler attacks the basket, and the better those defenders are at getting into the best possible position to contest a layup/dunk.
- The higher you set Layup Defense Strength (Release), defenders will be more aggressive in attempting to contest once the dribbler is in the air about to finish the layup/dunk, and the animations triggered will be more successful at affecting (or even blocking) the layup/dunk.
- The higher you set Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather), off-ball defenders will be more aggressive when fighting through screens and/or closing down an open shooter, as well as more effective when guarding a shooter on the perimeter (as they are quicker to react when you decide to spot up).
- The higher you set Jump Shot Defense Strength (Release), shot contests and block attempts will trigger better animations that will cover more distance while jumping to contest a shot, meaning defenders can be further away from a shooter while still being a threat to block or severely affect shot success.

To put it simply, setting the Takeoff/Gather sliders higher means that defenders are more aggressive and more affective at contesting a layup or shot when the shooting animation first begins, and the greater the variety of shot/layup animations will trigger to incorporate the nearest defender. Setting the Release sliders higher means shot contest/block animations are more aggressive and more affective at both covering distance and accurately targeting the ball, meaning defenders don't have to be right in your face at the start of a shot in order to have a noticeable affect on shot success.

If you want defenders to be better at closing down shooters and fighting through screens, increase the Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) slider. If you want better shot contest animations and/or more shot contest/block attempts increase the Release slider(s). If you don't want a nearby defender to affect the shot as much unless they're actively contesting the shot, decrease the Takeoff slider (for layups) and/or Gather slider (for jump shots) based off what results you're looking for.


HELP DEFENSE/DEFENSIVE ROTATIONS/DEFENDER DECISION MAKING - UPDATED MAY 3RD


I'm INCREDIBLY happy to say that, unlike year's past, the Defense Strength sliders do not meaningfully affect help defense/defensive rotations/defender decision making. In past years, setting the Layup sliders higher than the Jump Shot sliders (or vice versa) had a noticeable impact on defensive rotations and help defense, as (based off your settings) the defense would either prioritize crashing to protect the paint over defending the perimeter (making it far too easy to kick out for an easy 3 point shot), or they would be unwilling to sag off perimeter shooters making it far to easy to attack the basket at will. This made it impossible to tweak things "perfectly" as you always had to choose to sacrifice either animation quality, defensive decision making, or the impact of good defending on shot success rate. Now that the Defense Strength sliders ONLY affect animations and defensive impact on shot success, it is finally possible to have your cake and eat it too!

And the best news of all, I don't need to test for (literally) endless hours trying to find the right balance between animations/shot success/rotations and then tweaking the rest of the slider set to provide ineffective band-aid fixes to the problems caused by these settings...


So there we have it! The testing is done and the findings are rendered. Now we all know what each of these four sliders controls and we can tweak our own personal settings accordingly!

I am more than happy to answer any questions you may have, give suggestions, and/or provide any clarity that is needed when it comes to any or all of these settings, so don't be shy! Just reply to this thread and I will help out as best as I can.


Happy tweaking!


Outdated information from the last update in 2016, for those interested:

Spoiler

Here is a video posted by Da Czar himself finally clarifying (somewhat vaguely) what exactly these sliders do:

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/aZd0gNrEy6s" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Currently testing so I can better describe the changes these values make. I will update this post whenever I have new information.

EDIT: Alright, after weeks of rigorous testing I have posted all of my results.

My work here is done, and I can actually start PLAYING the game instead of testing. But hey, I did this so that everyone can have a better understanding of how the game works, and hopefully now we can all better tweak the game to play the way we want it to. If you're interested in learning a few things (and reading a LOT), continue down this post.

To get the full experience, check out my slider thread and set everything exactly as I have posted. Otherwise, use this thread as a helpful tool in constructing your own slider set (or tweaking your favorite slider guru's set), and enjoy the best representation of video game basketball in history.

Enjoy guys


FINAL THOUGHTS + MY SETTINGS - UPDATED FEBRUARY 15TH

Spoiler

The most important aspect of defensive tuning comes down to the Takeoff/Gather sliders. The closer you can get these to 100, the AI will have better reactions and the game will trigger more multiple player/context-based animations. The (Release) settings do NOT carry any significant effect on player reactions or defensive fluidity/rotations. These control how much a hand in the shooter's face affects shot success and are therefore fairly dependent on the Shot Success sliders (NO WAY!).

With the Takeoff/Gather sliders set to 100 there are really no more "wide open" shots unless the shooter has a ridiculous amount of space between himself and the defender, meaning that the Shot Success sliders need to be increased until a realistic percentage of "open" (i.e. not heavily contested) shots go down. Once that happens, you can tweak the Release sliders until you feel a realistic number of contested shots go in as well.

One of the first things you'll notice after increasing the Defense Strength sliders is an inability to score down low. You will often get basically TACKLED when you attempt a contested shot close to the basket. To fix this is quick and easy: simply increase Contact Shot Success for both the User and CPU by a few ticks until you see realistic collisions and more successful layups/and-1s. I currently have this set at 49 for both User/CPU, but this will obviously vary depending on your slider set, User-Timing/Real Shooting %, other shot success sliders, etc. Just tweak the Contact Shot Success slider until you're happy.

Now as I point out below throughout some of my in-depth testing, the Defense Strength sliders do have a noticeable affect on the CPU offensive tendencies, so you may have to increase their mid-range/3pt shooting tendencies to offset the improved defense.


My Settings

After all of my testing, I have finally settled on what I feel are the best possible settings, as well as a few important tweaks to other affected sliders as well. These settings will give you true-to-life player interaction, jump shot/layup animations, and fluid/intelligent defensive reactions and rotations.

Defense
Driving Contact Shot Frequency - 100
Inside Contact Shot Frequency - 100
Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) - 90
Layup Defense Strength (Release) - 90
Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) - 70
Jump Shot Defense Strength (Release) - 80
Help Defense Strength - 65
Steal Success - 55/50

These settings remove the disadvantages of high Defense Strength sliders (overzealous/exaggerated shot contests, inability to make contested shots, etc.) while maintaining almost all of the positives. As I said above, you will have to tweak your Shot Success sliders to account for these settings, but that is a fairly quick process. Set On Ball defense somewhere near 25 (as pointed out in the "Reduced Bumping" section below) and the gameplay is absolutely incredible.

Check out my slider thread for full settings.

REDUCED BUMPING/SUCTION-CUP DEFENSE - UPDATED FEBRUARY 7TH

Spoiler

One of the biggest issues with 2k16's gameplay is the abundance of bumping and suction-cup defense on the perimeter. I'm sure many of you have read through this post/all the updates down below and thought "If increasing the Takeoff/Gather sliders adds MORE contact animations, won't this just make the game even MORE of a bump-fest????". Thankfully, the answer to that is a resounding NO, as long as you remove the cause of these bump/suction-cup animations. To do so is surprisingly simple! Here's how:

At higher difficulty levels, the CPU receives boosts to a few of their attributes, namely Acceleration, Strength, Speed, and Lateral Quickness. While other Attributes also receive boosts, these are the most prominent ones as they cause a variety of unrealistic things to happen such as slow players on the CPU team outrunning fast players on the USER team, they skew a variety of in-game mechanics and statistics (such as smaller players getting more rebounds/blocks), etc. These settings are also partially to blame for all of the bumping and suction-cup animations on the perimeter. Because the CPU has more speed, acceleration, strength, and lateral quickness, they can easily beat the ball-handler to any spot on the floor, cutting off the lane and acting like a brick wall.

Seeing as most slider sets use the Superstar difficulty, most of us are running into these problems caused by the CPU boosts. So, when playing on Superstar difficulty, set the value of these CPU sliders to five LESS than the USER value. This will eliminate (or at least alleviate) the CPU's physical advantages over the USER. (I have no idea what the CPU boosts are at Hall of Fame difficulty, but past experience suggests 7-10 points so make sure the USER has a 7-10 advantage over the CPU in these Attributes). At All-Star difficulty and lower, these boosts are not present and bumping is not as bad of a problem, so no tweaks need to be made.

However, there will STILL be a lot of unrealistic collisions on the perimeter, which leads me to the most important slider: On-Ball Defense. Surprise surprise, this slider controls the way players react during on-ball defensive situations, and it is the root cause of the suction-cup animations. Simply decrease this slider for both the USER and CPU until you are happy with perimeter defense. Right now I have this slider settling somewhere between 20 and 30, with 25 being my "happy medium". You will still see some collisions on the perimeter, but only when there is a physical mismatch or when going up against an elite defender. In all other situations (unless you completely break the defender's ankles), the defender will stick with the ball-handler as he drives to the basket and will often initiate a "riding the hip" animation. This is as true-to-life as it gets, as you can take advantage of weak defenders or a physical mismatch (a PG being covered by a center, for example) to blow by the defender, or (in more even match-ups) the defender stays close enough to contest the shot without being a force-field.

SLIDER ANALYSIS + CPU OFFENSIVE MINDSET/STRATEGY - UPDATED JAN 29TH

Spoiler

As Da Czar said, these sliders control how the game weighs the defensive impact on a shot/layup attempt. Increasing the Takeoff/Gather sliders adds more weight to the defense's actions as a player begins a layup/shot attempt. The Release sliders add more weight to the defense's actions as a player releases the ball. If you want the defense to affect a layup/shot more at release, increase the Release sliders, and vice-versa if you want the defense to have more of an affect at the start of the layup/shot. So far, this is pretty self-explanatory. However, the Gather/Takeoff sliders have an additional affect on gameplay: They alter the CPU's offensive mindset and strategy.

In-Depth Analysis

If you have "Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather)" set higher than "Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff)", the CPU will know that the defense is tougher on jumpshots and will therefore work harder to get the ball in-close and will pass up most jumpshots if the shooter doesn't have decent space to shoot.

This is a VERY important finding as it should help many slider makers fine-tune their AI tendencies. Have you ever noticed that some slider sets have drastic differences between Inside/Close and Mid-Range/3PT tendencies in order to force the AI to take more jumpshots, whereas other slider sets have fairly balanced Inside/Close and Mid-Range/3PT tendencies and still get plenty of jumpshots? This is the reason why!

As for the "(Release)" sliders, these do exactly what you'd think: Control the impact of the defense's actions at the point of release. Think of it as the "And-1" slider. With the "(Release)" sliders set too low, the probability of a well-defended shot (at release) going in is pretty high. If too many shots are going in while a defender has a hand in the shooters face, increase the Jump Shot Defense Strength (Release) slider. If you're noticing a lot of penalties on layups without any and-1s, decrease the Layup Defense Strength (Release) slider until a few more layups go in.

Remember that the Takeoff/Gather and Release sliders work together to impact a layup/shot's chance of going in. If you miss a lot of shots in traffic when the defense DOES NOT get a hand in the shooter's face, you may need to lower the (Gather) slider. If you don't meet any defense on your way through the lane but then CONSTANTLY miss layups after a defender gets his hand up at the rim, decrease the Layup (Release) slider. If you have to fight through multiple defenders as you attempt your layup, but miss at the rim even though no defender got their hand(s) up, decrease the Layup (Release) slider.

My Guideline on the Defense Strength Sliders

Make sure that "Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather)" is lower than or equal to "Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff)", as it will lead to more drive-and-kick offensive possessions, more pull-up jumpers, and more passes by the CPU before each shot. If the Layup (Takeoff) defense slider is lower than Jump Shot (Gather), the CPU will continue to force their way into the paint, ignore perimeter shooters, and have limited ball movement in their half-court sets. Don't set the Jump Shot (Gather) slider too low, though, or else you will have too many open players around the perimeter, poor defense against pick-and-roll/fade, and a lack of proper player interaction/jump-shot animations and variety. Once you have the right balance from the CPU offense and User/CPU defensive decision making and animations, increase the (Release) sliders until you start seeing the amount of missed layups/shots that you want.

ANIMATIONS AND DEFENSIVE DECISION MAKING - UPDATED FEBRUARY 2ND

Spoiler

I've been doing some more testing today. Right now I'm focusing on the Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) slider, and I've found that this slider greatly affects player interaction/animations as well as defensive decision making.

Player Interaction/Animations

With the (Gather) slider set higher, there are more animations triggered on the perimeter and during shots. Players react to defenders in both the way they move as well as the way they shoot. The higher this slider, the more of these "player interaction" animations. Therefore, with this set low, players do not react to each other very much on the perimeter (fewer bump animations, more gliding, etc.), and the game will often ignore the presence of a defender when choosing a shot animation (i.e. if a defender is right in the shooter's face contesting a shot, no animation will trigger to have the shooter react to the defender's presence). If this slider is set high, however, the shooter will change up his body positioning and shot animation if a defender is contesting his shot.

Defensive Decision Making

The higher the (Gather) slider is set, the more aggressive defenders will be (both on and off the ball) at sticking to their man on the perimeter. Shooters are played more closely and will often be blocked from moving freely (trying to get open) by their defender. Also, with this slider set high, the defense is LESS likely to collapse into the lane if the ball-handler attacks the basket, deciding instead to stick close to a perimeter shooter. If the slider is set low, perimeter defenders are MORE likely to collapse into the paint if the ball-handler attacks the basket, leaving a shooter open. This also has an affect on how the defense reacts to the pick-and-roll. With the (Gather) slider set low, the defense is more likely to ignore the pick player (if he is set to Fade) and will leave him open on the perimeter as they double team the ball-handler. With this slider set high, the defense reacts to the pick-and-roll much more intelligently and will only ignore the pick player if the ball-handler gets a free release. In simple terms, getting a wide-open shot off the pick-and-fade is more difficult/rare the higher the (Gather) slider is set.



So, in short, with the (Gather) slider set high, you will see more player interaction animations, a wider variety of jump-shot animations, the defense will "stay at home" on a perimeter shooter more often, there will be less defensive rotations (due to the defenders not rotating away from a shooter) and the pick-and-roll/fade is more intelligently defended. All of this on top of the affects I pointed out in the updated OP, the most important of which being that the CPU will be more likely to shoot in traffic/pull-up as well as more likely to take a contested jumpshot if the (Gather) slider is set low.

Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) has an almost identical effect inside the paint. At lower values, the ball-handler is more likely to ignore the presence of a defender at takeoff and therefore fewer multiple-player animations will trigger, resulting in awkward/unrealistic results (the defender being slid out of the way, not making a play on the ball, etc.). At higher settings, more multiple-man animations are triggered and the defenders' positioning was taken into account as the ball-handler attacked the basket.

WHO DO THE USER/CPU SLIDERS AFFECT? - UPDATED FEBRUARY 2ND

Spoiler

Just in case there's a need for the User and CPU to have different settings for these sliders, I went ahead and tested to see who exactly these sliders were affecting. Thankfully there should be little confusion this year, as all four of these sliders affect the OFFENSE of the team you are setting them for.

So for example, if you put all four sliders at 100 for the USER and 0 for the CPU, the CPU will have an EASIER time on offense while the USER will find it HARDER to create space and score. If you need to make it more difficult for the CPU to score, INCREASE the relevant defense strength sliders on the CPU slider screen.

MORE FOULS ON JUMP SHOTS - UPDATED FEBRUARY 3RD

Spoiler

People have been complaining for years that there are too few fouls on jump shots. Well, I figured out how to get more of them. You need to have Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) set low (the lower it's set, the more fouls you'll see), and Jump Shot Defense Strength (Release) set high (the higher it's set, the more fouls you'll see). However, the (Gather) slider is much more important than the (Release) slider when it comes to fouls, as I was seeing fouls with (Release) at 0 but not seeing much of any with (Gather) set at 100.

Now the reasoning for this is quite simple. With (Gather) set low, the shooter will not change his body position much to account for a defender in his face. With the shooter and defender having less distance between them, there is obviously a higher chance of contact on the shot and, therefore, a foul call. Also, with (Gather) set low the CPU will be less picky when taking shots and will take more shots in traffic. This, coupled with the lack of animations triggering to create space between the shooter and defender, will again lead to more foul calls.

Setting (Release) higher adds to this in a simple way: with (Release) set higher the defenders are more aggressive on their shot-contests and more animations will get triggered at the release of the shot to "sell" a foul call. Now these animations don't actually add to the number of foul calls, but they make it LOOK like there was a foul and it adds more variety to jumpshots, so it's a win-win.

If you read all the way to this point, congratulations! Let me know your findings so we can (HOPEFULLY) come to a consensus once and for all!




Original post for those interested (contains severely outdated testing and information)

Spoiler

The Layup Defense Strength sliders control how well THAT team's defense plays. If the USER Layup Defense Strength sliders are set to 100, the USER defense will be very strong against layups. However, the Jump Shot Defense Strength sliders control the OTHER teams defense, so putting these sliders at 0 for the USER will result in the CPU defense playing poorly, and vice-versa.

The (Takeoff/Gather) sliders affect animations, defensive movement/help, and decision making. With Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) at 0, the defense as a whole will not attempt to contest a layup. If set to 100, however, multiple defenders will contest the layup. With Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) at 0, the ball-handler will basically ignore the fact that a defender is in their chest and will pull up for a jumper, and this will NOT trigger a contested jumpshot/runner/leaner animation. It will just seem like the defender isn't their. If set to 100, the ball-handler will react to a defender in his chest, and any jump shot attempted in traffic will trigger an appropriate animation. This affects the CPU decision making because the lower the (Gather) sliders are, the more likely the CPU is to take a contested jumpshot/layup. The final affect the (Gather) slider has is how much attention/help the defense gives toward an open shooter. With this slider at 100, nearby defenders will attack the ball-handler off of a pick-and-roll or drive attempt and not give them a lot of space to get a shot off. However, this leaves perimeter players unguarded. So in essence, the higher the (Takeoff/Gather) sliders are, the more attention off-ball defenders will give the ball-handler and the more aggressively they will help on defense.

Now, once the ball leaves the shooter's hands, the (Release) sliders go into effect. At 0, the game treats every contested shot/layup as if no defender is there. The higher these values are set, the less likely a contested shot/layup is to go in. That's it.

So to put it simply:
Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) - 100 means someone is going to come defend a layup.
Layup Defense Strength (Release) - 100 means that a contested layup is not likely to go in.
Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) - 100 means that the CPU is less likely to take a jump shot in traffic, and if they do take a contested shot an appropriate animation will trigger. Also, other defenders will close in on the ball-handler and limit their space to shoot, leaving perimeter players open. At 0, perimeter defenders will stick to their assignment instead of rotating down to help.
Jump Shot Defense Strength (Release) - 100 means that jump shots that are in traffic and/or contested will be much less likely to go in.

The more you decrease these sliders, the less true each of these statements becomes.

EDIT: The (Takeoff/Gather) sliders control awareness, aggressiveness, AND priority on defensive rotations, and they also work in tandem with the Help Defense Strength Slider. I'm doing a few tests real quick so I can properly define how these three all relate to each other. This will FINALLY explain the logic behind defensive rotations in this game, and give us the ability to make the CPU react on defense EXACTLY how we want them to.

Stay tuned.

EDIT 2: Here's what I've found so far with the Takeoff/Gather sliders:

Put the value listed for both the User and CPU sliders

Takeoff - 0, Gather - 0
- Off-ball defenders stayed out on the perimeter
- Little/no help D on driving defender, jump shots, or layups/inside shots
- On the PnR, the far-side corner defender rotates down to cover the lane, and the nearby perimeter defender rotates down to cover the corner
- Easy to drive the lane or pass it to the rolling PF/C

Takeoff - 100, Gather - 0
- Off-ball defenders are more aware of the ball-handler driving the lane and bring more help
- Better animations on layups/shots down low
- Perimeter shooters still well covered
- PnR is well defended

Takeoff - 0, Gather - 100
- Off-ball defenders are more aware of open space for ball-handler to spot up from
- Perimeter defenders sag-off outside shooters to help close space in the mid-range
- Little help on layups/inside shots
- Outside shooters are often left open on defensive rotations
- Better animations on jump shot contests
- PnR ball-handler is well defended, rolling PF/C has an opening inside

Takeoff - 100, Gather - 100
- Off-ball defenders vary between rotating into the paint or staying at home on the perimeter
- Help is almost always brought on defense
- Defenders close out quickly on open shooters
- Better animations on layups/inside shots as well as on jump shot contests
- PnR is well defended, both the ball-handler and the rolling PF/C

[ThatMichiganFan]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Wow nice work. This is very good information to have.

[Shady Mike]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Alright, so I've done some more testing and this is what I've found for the Defense sliders:

The Layup Defense Strength sliders control how well THAT team's defense plays. If the USER Layup Defense Strength sliders are set to 100, the USER defense will be very strong against layups. However, the Jump Shot Defense Strength sliders control the OTHER teams defense, so putting these sliders at 0 for the USER will result in the CPU defense playing poorly, and vice-versa.

The (Takeoff/Gather) sliders affect animations and decision making. With Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) at 0, the defense as a whole will not attempt to contest a layup. If set to 100, however, multiple defenders will contest the layup. With Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) at 0, the ball-handler will basically ignore the fact that a defender is in their chest and will pull up for a jumper, and this will NOT trigger a contested jumpshot/runner/leaner animation. It will just seem like the defender isn't their. If set to 100, the ball-handler will react to a defender in his chest, and any jump shot attempted in traffic will trigger an appropriate animation. This affects the CPU decision making because the lower the (Gather) sliders are, the more likely the CPU is to take a contested jumpshot/layup.

Now, once the ball leaves the shooter's hands, the (Release) sliders go into effect. At 0, the game treats every contested shot/layup as if no defender is there. The higher these values are set, the less likely a contested shot/layup is to go in. That's it.

So to put it simply:
Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) - 100 means someone is going to come defend a layup.
Layup Defense Strength (Release) - 100 means that a contested layup is not likely to go in.
Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) - 100 means that the CPU is less likely to take a jump shot in traffic, and if they do take a contested shot an appropriate animation will trigger.
Jump Shot Defense Strength (Release) - 100 means that jump shots that are in traffic and/or contested will be much less likely to go in.

The more you decrease these sliders, the less true each of these statements becomes.

Right on the money with your assessment, but I believe you reversed the two sliders, the from my testing the "Gather" aspect of the Jumpshot defense slider is what impacts the success rate of the shot.

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Right on the money with your assessment, but I believe you reversed the two sliders, the from my testing the "Gather" aspect of the Jumpshot defense slider is what impacts the success rate of the shot.

I'll re-run a few tests to double-check, but I'm 99% sure the Release slider impacts the success rate. I'll post back in a few minutes!

EDIT: Alright, just ran some tests. The (Release) slider definitely impacts the success of a shot. First I just tested by eye, taking contested jump shots with the slider at 0 and at 100. At 0 the shots went in at a much higher rate. Then, just to double check, I turned on Shot Feedback and took more contested jump shots. With (Release) at 0 my shots routinely got an A+ rating, but with it at 100 my shots were rated C or lower.

Now, you're not exactly wrong by saying the Gather slider impacts jump shot success rate, as it controls the awareness, defensive attention, and aggression with which the defense contests jump shots. So if you have the (Release) slider at 100 and (Gather) at 0, there won't actually BE as many contested shots so the success rate will still be high and the grade given by Shot Feedback will be high as well. But with (Gather) at 100 there will be more defenders nearby and more contested shots.

[Shady Mike]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

I'll re-run a few tests to double-check, but I'm 99% sure the Release slider impacts the success rate. I'll post back in a few minutes!

EDIT: Alright, just ran some tests. The (Release) slider definitely impacts the success of a shot. First I just tested by eye, taking contested jump shots with the slider at 0 and at 100. At 0 the shots went in at a much higher rate. Then, just to double check, I turned on Shot Feedback and took more contested jump shots. With (Release) at 0 my shots routinely got an A+ rating, but with it at 100 my shots were rated C or lower.

Now, you're not exactly wrong by saying the Gather slider impacts jump shot success rate, as it controls the awareness, defensive attention, and aggression with which the defense contests jump shots. So if you have the (Release) slider at 100 and (Gather) at 0, there won't actually BE as many contested shots so the success rate will still be high and the grade given by Shot Feedback will be high as well. But with (Gather) at 100 there will be more defenders nearby and more contested shots.

So basically you are saying that if the gather slider is at 100 and the release slider is at 0 the shot even though the shot is contested it should more than likely go in (or at least have a high grade) correct?

I've been playing at 0/100 (gather/release) for the past week or so to do some testing and contested shots SEEM to be going in at an insanely high rate like in the video I showed you earlier.

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

So basically you are saying that if the gather slider is at 100 and the release slider is at 0 the shot even though the shot is contested it should more than likely go in (or at least have a high grade) correct?

I've been playing at 0/100 (gather/release) for the past week or so to do some testing and contested shots SEEM to be going in at an insanely high rate like in the video I showed you earlier.

Yea, the two definitely work together. So if you have either at 0, shots are going to drop at a high clip. Gather at 0 means the defense really isn't contesting the shots well/at all, and Release at 0 means that even if there is a strong contest, the shot will probably go in anyway. So the key is finding the correct Gather value, and then tweaking Release from there. As I said at the bottom of the OP, the Takeoff/Gather/Help Defense sliders all work in tandem to control the awareness, aggression, and priority of defensive rotations and contested shots. Once we have the defense REACTING properly, rotating smoothly and intelligently while triggering appropriate driving/contested shot animations, THEN we can tweak the Release sliders to get the FG% right where we want it.

I'm running some more tests so that I can properly define and explain how the defense reacts based on how these sliders are set. I'm trying to find the "perfect" balance where rotations will come in to force a kick out while still moving over to cover open shooters on the perimeter, forcing more ball movement on offense and thus fewer shot attempts, fewer wide-open looks, lower FG%, and more exciting gameplay

[Shady Mike]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Not sure if you saw the video that I edited in my last post but here it is, I'm not sold on this at all yet, I went into practice mode with the gather sliders for both teams at 100 and the release sliders at 0 and the CPU missed every contested 3 they took (including an air ball) and all of my mid range jumpshots with Duncan were extremely low grade due to the contest even with the release slider at 0 by this video it looks like the gather slider effects the success rate of contested shots because when I had this on 0/100 the CPU was splashing nonsense all day...

<iframe frameborder="0" width="480" height="270" src="//www.dailymotion.com/embed/video/x2qv8v8" allowfullscreen></iframe><br /><a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2qv8v8_shot-defense-testing_videogames" target="_blank">Shot defense testing</a> <i>by <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/shadymikegaming" target="_blank">shadymikegaming</a></i>

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Not sure if you saw the video that I edited in my last post but here it is, I'm not sold on this at all yet, I went into practice mode with the gather sliders for both teams at 100 and the release sliders at 0 and the CPU missed every contested 3 they took (including an air ball) and all of my mid range jumpshots with Duncan were extremely low grade due to the contest even with the release slider at 0 by this video it looks like the gather slider effects the success rate of contested shots because when I had this on 0/100 the CPU was splashing nonsense all day...

<iframe frameborder="0" width="480" height="270" src="//www.dailymotion.com/embed/video/x2qv8v8" allowfullscreen></iframe><br /><a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2qv8v8_shot-defense-testing_videogames" target="_blank">Shot defense testing</a> <i>by <a href="http://www.dailymotion.com/shadymikegaming" target="_blank">shadymikegaming</a></i>

I went in to do more testing and the only concrete thing I could come up with is that I'm no longer using the Shot Feedback to judge anything. No matter what I had the Gather/Release sliders at the Shot Feedback remained consistent. Shots with perfect timing were an A, very poor timing was an F, and everything else just mixed in between.

With Release at 0 I saw a lot of poorly contested shots, as in my defenders hands deliberately moved OUT of the path of the ball so the offense could get off a good shot. What I'm thinking is that they both impact jump shot success differently. With Gather set low the defenders don't get in the shooter's face enough to really affect a shot, and with Release set low the defenders are awful at actually getting a hand in front of the ball or at least in front of the shooter's line of sight to the basket.

I've gotta take a break from testing for right now, I'm getting frustrated and burned out haha. Time to load up Battlefield 4 Premium for the first time (it's on sale this week on PSN!) and get my mind off confusing defensive logic for a minute.

[Shady Mike]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

I went in to do more testing and the only concrete thing I could come up with is that I'm no longer using the Shot Feedback to judge anything. No matter what I had the Gather/Release sliders at the Shot Feedback remained consistent. Shots with perfect timing were an A, very poor timing was an F, and everything else just mixed in between.

With Release at 0 I saw a lot of poorly contested shots, as in my defenders hands deliberately moved OUT of the path of the ball so the offense could get off a good shot. What I'm thinking is that they both impact jump shot success differently. With Gather set low the defenders don't get in the shooter's face enough to really affect a shot, and with Release set low the defenders are awful at actually getting a hand in front of the ball or at least in front of the shooter's line of sight to the basket.

I've gotta take a break from testing for right now, I'm getting frustrated and burned out haha. Time to load up Battlefield 4 Premium for the first time (it's on sale this week on PSN!) and get my mind off confusing defensive logic for a minute.

Yea idk man...shot stick timing is tough to judge because the release has SO much to do with the outcome of the shot to begin with! Regardless of the defense! Yo I used to be THE **** on BF4 on the PS4 lol good thing you waited to get that one, that was a mess at launch...

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Yea idk man...shot stick timing is tough to judge because the release has SO much to do with the outcome of the shot to begin with! Regardless of the defense! Yo I used to be THE **** on BF4 on the PS4 lol good thing you waited to get that one, that was a mess at launch...

Yeah, BF4 is awesome! Glad I got out some of my frustration there, and I got back to testing a few hours ago. I posted what I've found so far as the second edit of the OP, take a look.

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Alright, so what I'm finding today is that the game plays MUCH better with Layup Defense Strength (Takeoff) at 100 for USER/CPU. The awareness/aggression to help down low and the animations that are triggered on these close shots/layups are awesome. The Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) slider is still a little tricky to nail down, as I don't want a ton of open shooters on every play. I'll post back once I find the best setting.

[Shady Mike]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Finished with my sliders, and after many hours I can confirm 100% that my original assessment was accurate. In terms of Real shooting % the only thing that effected the actual success of the shot was the Gather slider while the Release slider greatly effects the type of contests and the actual effort to get there:

Anyways guys just an update on what I referenced earlier with the jumpshot defense sliders...I can officially confirm 100% that the shot "defense" slider effects the respective team on OFFENSE (so it's reversed) so 0/100 would result in the CPU having terrible defense, and the HUM having basically no shot defense, while 100/0 would result in an easier time for the CPU! So before I update the sliders I want to do some testing to see how I can incorporate this new information into my set, stay tuned!

EDIT:Even MORE new information, the Jump Shot Defense Strength (release) slider effects how hard the CPU will contest your jumpshot...(So basically just the animations) while the Jump Shot Defense strength (Gather) slider represents how much the contest that has taken place will actually IMPACT whether or not the shot goes in!

So basically what this means is we can now set our shooting sliders LOWER to result in more misses in Wide open situations, but we can also lower the contest sliders so that a wide open shot doesn't ALWAYS result in a make, and a contested shot doesn't ALWAYS result in a miss! I'm excited for this.

I ended up running with:

Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) -10/5
Jump Shot Defense (Release) - 70/70

So now with a high release defense slider guys make every effort to contest shots, but with a low gather slider for guys with the Deadeye badge the defense will have virtually have no effect on them at all. Thanks for your help on the issue!

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

Finished with my sliders, and after many hours I can confirm 100% that my original assessment was accurate. In terms of Real shooting % the only thing that effected the actual success of the shot was the Gather slider while the Release slider greatly effects the type of contests and the actual effort to get there:



I ended up running with:

Jump Shot Defense Strength (Gather) -10/5
Jump Shot Defense (Release) - 70/70

So now with a high release defense slider guys make every effort to contest shots, but with a low gather slider for guys with the Deadeye badge the defense will have virtually have no effect on them at all. Thanks for your help on the issue!

So basically you're saying that 2K reversed what those two sliders have done in every other game in the series? Classic 2K smh

I still haven't been able to find conclusive enough results to fully agree 100% with your findings, but the more I play (and the more frustrated I get), the more I tend to agree.

Thanks!

[MoneyOvaHuds]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

So which take off gather combo do you suggest ?

[EccentricMeat]

Re: The &quot;Shot Defense Strength&quot; Sliders Explained

I'm still testing, but I've stuck with 100/100 for the most part. I'll post here if I find anything better.