Cheap UFA Fix

Elias26 · Post by **Elias26** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 6:04 pm

Anyone know of a way to fix the cheap UFA problem? I am using the latest patch with original rosters. Do the unfake rosters help at all (probably not)? Maybe maxing out every teams ticket revenue with the Pre-game editor and giving them a ton of money would help?

hluraven · Post by **hluraven** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 6:09 pm

It's no better with unfake. I don't play EHM atm because of this

Elias26 · Post by **Elias26** » Tue Apr 04, 2006 6:17 pm

hluraven wrote:It's no better with unfake. I don't play EHM atm because of this

I could see why it does kill the game when your team is so stacked you have Sacik as a 4th liner and your team is 21-1-1...

Post by **Minstrel** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 12:33 am

I can understand your points on this; but honestly you guys just have to police yourselves a bit. Yeah you can get FA for peanuts but yeah it will also kill your enjoyment of the game, so don't do it.

To say you won't play because of it is in my opinion kind of silly; it's not a problem if you don't sign Sakic to be a 4th liner and intstead design a team to be like an actual hockey team not like a PS2 EA team where you are shocked if you lose two games a season

Yeah, it's a issue but it's one you hold the solution to if you want to enjoy the game. Every sports sim ever created falls to this if you play it that way really, superteams kill your buzz because they throw the game out of balance and the concept of having the superteam is a heck of a lot more appealing than actually playing any sim or computer game with one. So, police yourself on what moves you make and it's not an issue.

Nothing in the game is forcing you to make these signings so to say it's why you don't play the game sounds rediculous to me.

Elias26 · Post by **Elias26** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 1:36 pm

Minstrel wrote:Nothing in the game is forcing you to make these signings so to say it's why you don't play the game sounds rediculous to me.

I play the game even though I'm really hoping this gets fixed in the next version. FA is a huge part of hockey and you shouldent have to force yourself not to sign Spezza for 2 million a season. Its easyer for some people to restrain themselvs I guess.

hluraven · Post by **hluraven** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 2:11 pm

Well, it may be easy to not make the signing, but then 10 of the best players a year drop out of the NHL as you cannot force the AI to sign them for anyone else. This also makes it far easier to win as the competition quickly gets depleted.

When you play FM, you can build up from the bottom realistically without having to restrain yourself or avoid dumb AI, so until EHM catches up I will be sticking to that. I know very well that EHM is a much smaller game, and in many ways beats FM hands down, but the AI kills it for me. The whole point in a management game to me is to see how well I can do, if I know I can win with ease because the AI is poor, there is little fun. If I have to continually help the AI to make it challenging, the point of playing has gone. That's just me at the moment, I'm about to start a EHM hotseat game with my girlfriend so at least there will be some competition, and some dilution of the squad I can build up as she will get some of the better players as well.

flea · Post by **flea** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 3:39 pm

I see both of your opinions and understand both ways as u say it, but its still sad that this happens.

I "force" myself not to sign these guys, but it really hampers (sp) the reality of the game!! Hey, its really unrealistic to see Jason Spezza, Dany Heatley or Jarome Iginla "hold out" a entire season because nobody wants to pay them....and then u see that there are teams that still have about 8 millions of salary cap room left at the middle of the season.

Right now Iam in the 2010-2011 season. Iam still in November and only about 15 games in, but there is still a center available in free agency who is called Joe Thornton.
Ironicly (spelling again, lol) I have a strong need of a center, because I just have lost Esposito and Mike Fisher due to injury....but Iam still forcing me in NOT signing Joe....sad but true

Post by **timmy_t** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 5:41 pm

Hey hluraven, have you tried a different league than the NHL? You won't have that problem with other leagues, and you'll actually benefit from it.

hluraven · Post by **hluraven** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 5:48 pm

True, except most of the good NHL players that do not sign an NHL contract end up in Europe

Kris · Post by **Kris** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 9:29 pm

Does this happen to you a lot? It's never happened to me. I am in my fourth season and all famous players have a new club (mostly Montreal signs 5-6 stars a season but have to waive them hehe). Most of the time they sign a new contract with the previous club, i.e. LidstrÃ¶m, Thornton, Spezza, Marleu etc.

Post by **Minstrel** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 11:35 pm

This is one of those things that I can assure you will be addressed in the next version which is just about to go into testing; it's a result of the new Cap system in the NHL which the AI teams don't quite have a handle on when big contracts come due instead of paying/overpaying like they used to now they wait and see what's out there first and often come back and resign their own players.

I know it's not perfect but for now it is avoidable from a user standpoint if you can just let it run it's course, I don't find it to be something that would make me stop playing the game but that's just my own opinion...

flea · Post by **flea** » Wed Apr 05, 2006 11:48 pm

Also, another thing is the IA lots of times dropping excellent players to waivers!!! OK, normally another club picks them up, but its rather strange to see the Bolts dropping Prospal to waivers, the Rangers Jessiman when he just was their best scorer and won the offensive player of the month in my game, lol.

Though was a good place to drop that, when we are talking about game reality, not??

If not, then sorry!!

handzus · Post by **handzus** » Thu Apr 06, 2006 7:16 am

flea wrote:Also, another thing is the IA lots of times dropping excellent players to waivers!!! OK, normally another club picks them up, but its rather strange to see the Bolts dropping Prospal to waivers, the Rangers Jessiman when he just was their best scorer and won the offensive player of the month in my game, lol.

Though was a good place to drop that, when we are talking about game reality, not??

If not, then sorry!!

Much like Calgary putting Phaneuf on waivers in my league. Just silly.

To be honest I've been giving thoughts to reinstalling the last patch before the salary cap was implemented. At least then I wouldn't see players like Sakic, Iginla, Thornton, and Samsonov on the UFA list with NO team interested in them, yet they would sign for cheap with whoever came to them.

Right now, I don't play FHM for pretty much the same reason: realism. Players are UFA's that shouldn't be UFA's, players get put on waivers when they're one of the best players on the team and don't make that much money, and a lot of the penalties and simming of games don't make much sense. I don't know if some of these things have been addressed, because I haven't really been here in a while.

Btw, the unrealistic simming thing stems mostly from the penalties. Almost every game I have players getting 10 minute misconduct penalties for arguing calls, where in the NHL this hardly EVER happens. I guess my team is just seriously undisciplined =\