Madden NFL 11 News Post

Madden: Editing Player Ratings in Franchise - Need Your Thoughts

10:57 AM - November 22, 2010 by Ian_Cummings

So Josh Looman and I looked into this a bit this morning and I thought I'd post back some results.

Good News: It's very easy enough to 'unlock' the screen to allow someone to edit everything about their players in Franchise mode. Took like 10 minutes to do.

Bad News: Unfortunately, there are about a million things that can go wrong with this unlocked. Now I realize what you all will use this feature for which is to fine-tune progression and try and get extremely realistic stats, but here are just a few of the things that came up when we messed around with it:

There are countless "cheesing" things that the user can do like dropping your player ratings right before the off-season, signing him to the cheapest deal possible, and then setting him back.
Your save file can easily be rendered non-functional if you change enough CPU team's player's ratings where they can't re-sign any players. At this point the mode typically crashes or hangs and won't be recoverable from.
We also don't display that potential rating in the edit player screen now, and if you were to edit the actual player's overall rating to be higher than his potential rating, the game has a chance of crashing in many different spots. We'd have to add it in and always force it to be higher than the OVR I guess.

So I need help from you all...

Please comment and be specific about what exactly you NEED to edit. What is your overall specific intent with wanting to edit these players? Are there certain time frames we can lock it to? Are there certain specific changes you could only be allowed to make instead of full league-wide control? By reducing the amount of variables we can look into finding ways to make this happen. Unfortunately allowing the user to set every player in the league anytime from a 0 to a 99 is not going to be an option because of all the instability it will cause...and we just don't have the testing man-power to ensure that the mode won't start crashing all over the place.

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# 1 stp2081 @ 11/22/10 11:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	- There are countless "cheesing" things that the user can do like dropping your player ratings right before the off-season, signing him to the cheapest deal possible, and then setting him back. - Your save file can easily be rendered non-functional if you change enough CPU team's player's ratings where they can't re-sign any players. At this point the mode typically crashes or hangs and won't be recoverable from. - We also don't display that potential rating in the edit player screen now, and if you were to edit the actual player's overall rating to be higher than his potential rating, the game has a chance of crashing in many different spots. We'd have to add it in and always force it to be higher than the OVR I guess.

My thoughts:
- In an offline franchise, the user should be allowed to "cheese" like that if he or she wants to do so.
- What is the approximate threshold? I think this risk is tolerable if the approximate threshold of going overboard with editing CPU teams' players is known. I know NZA's PC editor allowed global edits, but then again that was the PC.
- Allow the option to remove the potential rating altogether? I know many people are frustrated that it "artificially" acts as a cap on season stats-based progression.

# 2 aTTckr @ 11/22/10 11:24 AM

First of all it's great to already see you here in november asking us our opinions about the next Madden. Really appreciate that! Especially after the somewhat harsh criticism you received here after the podcast.

I don't think that the cheesing really is a problem. If a player wants to cheat himself and make his gameplay expierence worse in a offline franchise that's his problem.

For the problem with the potential rating/ ceiling: Why not let us rerate that aswell, that should probably take those sorts of complications you mentioned away.

# 3 Dog @ 11/22/10 11:47 AM

Seems like you are stuck between a rock and a hard place with this. For me, I don't feel the need to change player ratings in franchise mode. I edit player ratings in a separate roster file. In franchise, I view it as a simulation, so I just let the progression system work on its own. I edit equipment and things like that, but not player ratings

# 4 huskerwr38 @ 11/22/10 11:50 AM

Maybe you shouldn't really link contracts to ratings. Maybe link contracts to season stats and career stats, because in real life if a running back rushes for 1500 yards for two straight seasons, even if he runs a 4.7 40 and only has a vertical leap of 25 inches, he's going to get a big contract. That way, even if you re-rate Peyton Manning to an overall of 10 and you want to re-sign him, you'll still owe him a big contract because of his stats. However, if he's a 10 and he goes through the season, he'll obviously not do good and he can be signed to a lower contract. Hope that make sense.

As for rookies contracts can be link to a combination of their stats and combine performance.

# 5 Armor and Sword @ 11/22/10 11:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by huskerwr38


	Maybe you shouldn't really link contracts to ratings. Maybe link contracts to season stats and career stats, because in real life if a running back rushes for 1500 yards for two straight seasons, even if he runs a 4.7 40 and only has a vertical leap of 25 inches, he's going to get a big contract. That way, even if you re-rate Peyton Manning to an overall of 10 and you want to re-sign him, you'll still owe him a big contract because of his stats. However, if he's a 10 and he goes through the season, he'll obviously not do good and he can be signed to a lower contract. Hope that make sense. As for rookies contracts can be link to a combination of their stats and combine performance.

I think this is a great point. I just don't know if the build you guys are working with allow this.

I have never had the urge to edit player ratings while I am playing my franchise. As another poster pointed out I just edit and save them before going into franchise mode. Once I am past season one it really becomes my universe and I leave it to the progression system/injuries and performance to determine future ratings of my players.

Would it be cool to be able to edit in-season? Absolutely. But if it would create massive crashes and bugs no way.

It is very appreciated though that you posted here to get some fan feedback. I hope 2012 gives us that overhauled immersive offline franchise mode we are all pining for.

# 6 BezO @ 11/22/10 12:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	So Josh Looman and I looked into this a bit this morning and I thought I'd post back some results. Good News: It's very easy enough to 'unlock' the screen to allow someone to edit everything about their players in Franchise mode. Took like 10 minutes to do. Bad News: Unfortunately, there are about a million things that can go wrong with this unlocked. Now I realize what you all will use this feature for which is to fine-tune progression and try and get extremely realistic stats, but here are just a few of the things that came up when we messed around with it: - There are countless "cheesing" things that the user can do like dropping your player ratings right before the off-season, signing him to the cheapest deal possible, and then setting him back. - Your save file can easily be rendered non-functional if you change enough CPU team's player's ratings where they can't re-sign any players. At this point the mode typically crashes or hangs and won't be recoverable from. - We also don't display that potential rating in the edit player screen now, and if you were to edit the actual player's overall rating to be higher than his potential rating, the game has a chance of crashing in many different spots. We'd have to add it in and always force it to be higher than the OVR I guess. So I need help from you all... Please comment and be specific about what exactly you NEED to edit. What is your overall specific intent with wanting to edit these players? Are there certain time frames we can lock it to? Are there certain specific changes you could only be allowed to make instead of full league-wide control? By reducing the amount of variables we can look into finding ways to make this happen. Unfortunately allowing the user to set every player in the league anytime from a 0 to a 99 is not going to be an option because of all the instability it will cause...and we just don't have the testing man-power to ensure that the mode won't start crashing all over the place.

A few things...

-Potential is derived from physical traits. A big, fast, strong, agile athlete has more potential than a less athletic one. Either get rid of the potential ratings or reverse the set up so that the potential rating is based off the physical ratings. For example, when we up the speed, we up the potential.

-If neither of those work, allow us only to adjust ratings within the potential range. For example, A potential allows for max ratings, B potential allows for 89 and lower, and so on.

# 7 Instant C1a55ic @ 11/22/10 12:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by huskerwr38


	Maybe you shouldn't really link contracts to ratings. Maybe link contracts to season stats and career stats, because in real life if a running back rushes for 1500 yards for two straight seasons, even if he runs a 4.7 40 and only has a vertical leap of 25 inches, he's going to get a big contract. That way, even if you re-rate Peyton Manning to an overall of 10 and you want to re-sign him, you'll still owe him a big contract because of his stats. However, if he's a 10 and he goes through the season, he'll obviously not do good and he can be signed to a lower contract. Hope that make sense. As for rookies contracts can be link to a combination of their stats and combine performance.

THIS

I have also grown tired of seeing the CPU get players for dirt cheap, then i have to pay out of the butt. When you go to sign a guy, it says hes wants for example $450k, but when you sign him it jumps up to 950K+.

# 8 BezO @ 11/22/10 12:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by huskerwr38


	Maybe you shouldn't really link contracts to ratings. Maybe link contracts to season stats and career stats, because in real life if a running back rushes for 1500 yards for two straight seasons, even if he runs a 4.7 40 and only has a vertical leap of 25 inches, he's going to get a big contract. That way, even if you re-rate Peyton Manning to an overall of 10 and you want to re-sign him, you'll still owe him a big contract because of his stats. However, if he's a 10 and he goes through the season, he'll obviously not do good and he can be signed to a lower contract. Hope that make sense. As for rookies contracts can be link to a combination of their stats and combine performance.

!!!!

There are big, strong, fast guys throughout the league that are not that good and thus don't make as much. Average the last few years of stats & include the age in the formula. And "old" needs to be determined by position. A 33 y/o QB is not the same as a 33 y/o RB.

# 9 KBLover @ 11/22/10 12:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	- There are countless "cheesing" things that the user can do like dropping your player ratings right before the off-season, signing him to the cheapest deal possible, and then setting him back.

This is no different than changing him to a position he sucks at, signing him (or doing it to an CPU player and trading for him) then changing him back. In fact, that's faster than this in all likelihood since you'd have to remember what his ratings where and put them back. It's easier to remember "WR" than several numbers.

(Plus, weight performance heavier. Time to bring in the Production rating from HC 09 if only for helping determine contract talks. Make it UNABLE to be edited if you're so scared about user cheesing it too)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	- Your save file can easily be rendered non-functional if you change enough CPU team's player's ratings where they can't re-sign any players. At this point the mode typically crashes or hangs and won't be recoverable from.

Then...people shouldn't do that? I mean, maybe I'm coming from the PC world, but in OOTP I can create a league with no minor leagues, make it so the AI teams can't sign players by killing their revenue, and then release all the players. The AI will probably never be able to sign anyone after year because they'd be so far in the red.

So, I shouldn't do that.

Besides - how is this even possible? Really - would you have to make them all suck so bad that the AI wouldn't want them? Make them so good that they couldn't fit them under the cap? Change revenue so that they can't afford any contracts?

People just shouldn't do these things. Just like they shouldn't change player's positions to get cheaper contracts or easier trades or control every team only for the purposes of making unfair trades. It sounds like something that would be really involved and take a lot of time and I doubt would come up most of the time.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	- We also don't display that potential rating in the edit player screen now, and if you were to edit the actual player's overall rating to be higher than his potential rating, the game has a chance of crashing in many different spots. We'd have to add it in and always force it to be higher than the OVR I guess.

Every time a rating is edited, re-calc that player's POT rating. If new POT rating > 99, then new POT rating = 99. If new POT rating is higher than existing POT rating, then existing POT rating = new POT rating.

(Too bad Madden doesn't have the individual POT ratings like in HC...then it would just be a matter of doing that check for each rating and it would be as simple as if rating > POT, POT = rating, then calc overall POT based off the rating POTs)

Plus, doesn't this happen anyway? I swear in Madden 10 if I edited a player to all 99's his POT would go up. Maybe I was imagining things.

Would it be hard to add a field for Potential in the editor anyway? Don't show it in the normal game screen, just show it in the player editor.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	Please comment and be specific about what exactly you NEED to edit. What is your overall specific intent with wanting to edit these players? Are there certain time frames we can lock it to?

Off-season only would be fine with me. Once Preseason starts, things are locked in and the development algorithms of the game take over.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ian_Cummings_EA


	By reducing the amount of variables we can look into finding ways to make this happen. Unfortunately allowing the user to set every player in the league anytime from a 0 to a 99 is not going to be an option because of all the instability it will cause...and we just don't have the testing man-power to ensure that the mode won't start crashing all over the place.

Can't we already do that if we REALLY wanted to by editing a roster then playing franchise with that edited roster? I guess I'm not understanding. Isn't a player database a player database?

# 10 huskerwr38 @ 11/22/10 12:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BezO


	A few things... -Potential is derived from physical traits. A big, fast, strong, agile athlete has more potential than a less athletic one. Either get rid of the potential ratings or reverse the set up so that the potential rating is based off the physical ratings. For example, when we up the speed, we up the potential. -If neither of those work, allow us only to adjust ratings within the potential range. For example, A potential allows for max ratings, B potential allows for 89 and lower, and so on.

I think that is true. If there is a potential then that needs to factor in.

# 11 mm boost @ 11/22/10 12:52 PM

Thank you for getting our feedback Ian, it is much appreciated.

I, like some of the other guys, personally do not care to edit their ratings and such.

However, I would love it if you guys could expand the player editor to where we can change:

-muscle build (this is important)
-height
-skin color
-dreads/long hair/long hair color
-more equipment options (3/4 sleeve undershirts, knee braces, ankle braces, flak jackets, back plates - basically all of the customizable options that NCAA 11 has)

If we could put those things in, then I would be a MUCH happier camper with offline franchise. I never play online franchise.

# 12 ComfortablyLomb @ 11/22/10 12:57 PM

I don't see any reason why it is EA's concern if some Madden players choose to cheese up their own private offline franchises. Not enabling player editing for online franchises makes perfect sense with that concern but if a player wants to privately run a team of super mutants who happen to look like the Bengals then that's their idea of fun. Why not allow it? Generally I think EA games spend too much time ensuring the user doesn't play games on their own in ways EA doesn't want them to play them.

---

Regarding range of editing needed, while it's a disappointment if full control isn't given to the user I don't think full control 0-99 is needed anyway. Generally, it's the wide receivers that I think are a little too fast or a little too slow that drive me nuts. Or the tight end that I know literally has feet for hands but is given a catch rating in the 80s. If we had the ability to slide ratings 10 points in either direction that would probably be enough to fudge things closer to our perception of reality. 15-20 would be better but I think 10 would be a bare bones minimum. It's all about giving the user more ability to make the game fit their vision.

---

Editing player body types, skin color, appearance, equipment, and whatnot is of minimal value to me. It's nice to have the option to do so but after a few games I'm basically blind to that stuff. But I don't think that's what you're asking here.

# 13 KBLover @ 11/22/10 01:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BezO


	-Potential is derived from physical traits. A big, fast, strong, agile athlete has more potential than a less athletic one. Either get rid of the potential ratings or reverse the set up so that the potential rating is based off the physical ratings. For example, when we up the speed, we up the potential.

This makes a LOT of sense. I'd even want to take it a step further to include mental/technique ratings (weighted by position of course - RBF shouldn't matter as much to a WR as to a TE or FB and obviously much more to a OL. AWR should matter a lot to QBs while still of some importance everywhere else, etc)

Quote:

Originally Posted by BezO


	-If neither of those work, allow us only to adjust ratings within the potential range. For example, A potential allows for max ratings, B potential allows for 89 and lower, and so on.

What if we don't think the player should have that potential rating? For example, if the game gave Tebow A potential or disagreed with Mark Sanchez being A potential to start this season, but wanted to leave their actual ratings alone, but put their POTs at B?

Or we disagree with some of the POTs the 2011 real life class gets and want to modify just the POTs and not the actual ratings? I'm sure people in the "Brady was once rated D potential" crowd would want to do some "revisionist history" and have him develop in game from a youngster to a star, without having to make him a star from day one just to get A potential on him, and then start a franchise to see how he develops in game, things like that.

# 14 jyoung @ 11/22/10 01:22 PM

Just take the "potential" rating out of the game completely.

It has single-handedly ruined what was once a great franchise mode during the PS2 era.

Make progression solely based on playing time and stats accumulated.

Also, please bring back the offseason training camp minigames and in-season progressions from the old PS2 games.

Thanks for listening.

# 15 illwill10 @ 11/22/10 01:38 PM

I agree with taking the potential away. I feel if the progression would get improved to a weekly bases like the roster updates there would not be a need for editing ratings.
i just want customize everythhing else. They should add player morale and roles

# 16 Ian_Cummings @ 11/22/10 01:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by KBLover


	Then...people shouldn't do that? I mean, maybe I'm coming from the PC world, but in OOTP I can create a league with no minor leagues, make it so the AI teams can't sign players by killing their revenue, and then release all the players. The AI will probably never be able to sign anyone after year because they'd be so far in the red. So, I shouldn't do that.

I wish that was an acceptable answer, but unfortunately the powers that be that approve our game (i.e. Sony and Microsoft) won't allow a game through that has known crashes, even if you do "stupid user tricks" as we call them.

Keep the suggestions and comments coming guys - this is helpful discussion.

# 17 CM Hooe @ 11/22/10 02:11 PM

If there has to be a lock on ratings, I'd say lock them either A) before the playoffs start or B) during the "Advance To Offseason" step, and then don't unlock them until the preseason starts again.

I am ALWAYS for adding more user customization options, so naturally I'm in favor of opening this up.

# 18 jyoung @ 11/22/10 02:13 PM

One other thing that bugs me about the current Madden progression system:

Physical attributes, obviously, should decline.

But mental attributes and positional skills should not.

Ratings like awareness, play recognition, route running, coverage, blocking, etc. should not deteriorate.

NFL players do not get "dumber" once they hit their mid-late 30s.

They just "lose a step" and slow down to the point where they are no longer able to keep up on the field physically.

# 19 Hova57 @ 11/22/10 02:17 PM

Ian thanks for posing this to us.

few statements

maybe tie ratings stuff into an online site where changing the ratings can be taken out if it messes up the game ala teambuilder.

Rating changes can only occur per bye for each team and preseason before preseason games are played.

or have a global ratings increase option where the user mandates how how players can increase or decrease over a period of time. then tie it into individual stat for the position. So if you have a qb that throws 3 INT's avg for four games then his accuracy or awr falls 4 . I think ratings should increase or decrease based off four games played relative to his stats.

# 20 PlatooN @ 11/22/10 02:18 PM

Hey Ian, While this isnt a player rating edit related, it's still player editing related.

Can you guys seriously look into the "minimum player requirement" issue.

Is it beyond frustrating and time consuming when i want to start a new franchise and i want to tweak my player positions around.

We shouldn't have to Sign a player for the sole purpose of making a position change to a different player, then releasing that player you had just signed.

for instance

i have 2 of each of the O lineman.
i want to change my backup LT to RG
now i have to goto FA, sign a bum, make the change, then release the bum.

i understand limiting the positions a player can be changed to...like a CB to QB or something but with similar positions we should be able to swap them unhindered.

By the time i get my team the way i want it, i don't even feel like playing anymore.

i hope i explain this properly and you understand what i'm getting at.

thanks.

- A hardcore franchise-only player.

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