Challenge #37 Discussion - Blowing Up The Canucks!

[visualdarkness]

When I check the screenshots from your second season, honestly, I don't understand, how you could pile up so many penalties with every second player, if you did not let them fight and lowered their aggressiveness to "Easy"...

Dunno I'm a wizard or something. You see what I mean by tactics do nothing, nothing at all.

I personally have given up on this challenge for now, for very similar reasons to visualdarkness.

Join the crying quitters club, we really got cookies over here! It's simply no use when the other challengers got a guy like Tarasenko scoring 100points season one and and having great result making every other team crave their players, while we who started out brutal have all our players at three star value.

Visualdarkness:

Look, my first season was also disaster, dead-last in whole league. We lost many times by wide margin, four or five goal difference. But later on, despite losing streaks, we start to put "better" results, losing by one goal only etc. In my second season - I just finished Q2 - we are hovering around 6th-8th spot in the West, producing much more equal results and sometimes defeating even teams in upper echelons. Unfortunately, we lost plenty of games in overtime. But I see there significant difference and improvement despite the fact, that 90 % of my roster remain same as in the first season. Even my board is already pleased with performance and fans stopped raging and protesting.
I just had to give some effort and time into tinkering of my tactics and lines. If I would just "Give up" and simulate as fast as possible, I doubt something would improve. I never played for Canucks before, so my initial knowledge of the players was very limited. I expect some slump in this season again, I would be surprised to reach playoffs. Hope to finish second season tonight. But from the third season I want to attack playoffs for sure.

I "gave up" at the end of the second season as we were worse off than the first and nothing helped. Then we got even worse in the third so I got to a point where I tried different standard tactics and tweaked them while having my HC picking the line both before and under the games to maybe see if it was me, but it managed to get slightly worse.

So please tell be what I should have done better? It's not not like I haven't tried but mentally I've given up a long time ago. It's impossible for me to catcch up to the rest of you guys and I'm way to competitive in games against others to just play "for myself".

[batdad]

I personally have given up on this challenge for now, for very similar reasons to visualdarkness. I think looking back it's either my trade ability or the trade engine (once we suck, the guys can't be traded for a lot, so I can't improve, etc. etc.). Over the first 100 or so games in 10-15 game chunks I tried making tactics from scratch, I tried using all personal tactics, I tried using default tactics, and there really wasn't a large difference in results. I also virtually kept my lines the same all season since I didn't have any depth to assume changing them would work. Maybe its a lack of experience in 'coaching' (when I play personally I NEVER coach games, as I just haven't ever enjoyed the 2D match engine, I preferred CM/FM back in the text only days more.), but I am finding EA too hard to a nut to crack in that regard (keep in mind, I NEVER mastered 2007, and I think I've only won a couple of cups in 8 years.)

I do think he's hit on what I feel is the most frustrating, it's too far from obvious (to me at least) what is wrong with the tactic. Is your left defensman stupidly out of position due to his skill, morale, or what part of the tactic went wrong. I can't figure out why my team has completely stupid moments on the ice (oh look, a guy chased me behind the net, let's TURN INTO HIM, or we pulled the goalie on a PK with 1 minute left, let's CLEAR THE PUCK.). Why oh why does Tierney have the 4th or 5th best stats on my team but zero points in 15 games. Granted, this may be coming from a sour apples point of view, but the feedback is non-helpful or non-obvious as to what I'm doing so terribly wrong.

My personal plan- I'm playing with the challenge save I have under my rules (saved the old copy just in case I go back to it, but probably won't have time) and see if I can win PERIOD. Maybe I wasn't ready for challenges in EA... at least in 2007 I would be a playoff team in the challenges in a couple of years, but being on pace to be #1 overall pick two years in a row by a 10-15 point margin and not really understanding why isn't fun.

This is not at all why Visual is quitting the challenge. He is quitting because he is upset that he is not winning and says others must be exploiting the game. You are saying you cannot get things to work the way you hope they will. I would counsel not to give up on that. I am 100% for sure it is because you do not coach games all that often, and it is different.

Also I would not rely on what you see on the ice in the match engine as gospel. You will notice that you have dmen who just for no reason fire the puck into their corner. Why? because the match engine is not perfect and following it on highlights at any level is not accurate. That would be a giveaway. And I have never had one of those plays turn up as a give away in the stats at end of game. The engine is not accurate to the perfect degree. RELY ON WHAT YOUR STATS AND RATINGS TELL YOU ABOUT THE PLAYER. not in game engine. I have had guys (Yannick Weber looking at you) fire that puck in the corner over and over and come out of the game with an 8 rating. Why? Because that play is NOt something that actually happened or caused something bad to happen to the team. The visual is not really what happened. IT is a flaw in the agme.

It is funny because my worst dman is DIllon and I never ever see him do that. Yet he has giveaways over and over and low ratings when he plays.


Guys...I DO NOT EVEN FOLLOW WHAT THE MATCH ENGINE SHOWS ME A PLAYER IS DOING> I RELY ON THE NUMBERS TO TELL ME HOW HE IS DOING.

[Peter_Doherty]

I agree that Visual is coming across as a kid who flaps at the floor when he doesn't get what he want.

With that said you have maybe not found an exploit but you have become so good at tinkering with the personal settings that you can get really unrealistic defensive results. Getting those defensive numbers you got in especially the first season is just ridiculous and "proves" that the game has quite a bit to go before it's done. As i've said earlier i think you should try to get in touch with Riz and help him "fix" the tactics part of the game if possible. This is not in any way shape or form criticism toward you just to make that clear, if you found something that clearly works exceptionally well ofcourse you should keep doing it

On the same note Unknown and/or radiskull could do the same when it comes to the offensive part of the game. We all (atleast most of us) want the game to be as realistic as possible so if we consistenly get unrealistic results because of our tactics we should try to fix that if possible. I got some crazy numbers offensively in the Philly challenge but i haven't been able to replicate it in this.

[visualdarkness]

This really ticks me off Visual. I have been constantly winning at this game and EHM 2007, and I get accused of exploits? Give your head a shake.
Now I have said enough on this, and you telling me I exploit the game and have an alogrithm to win in this game really ticks me off. So go please hide somewhere else and cry. It is a game. You do not do well this time. Life goes on.

I'm just stressed out, annoyed and flu-ridden IRL and this game just feeding me Adam Oates in a bag is the last drop. I'm just jealous of your ultimate EHM knowledge and you know it. I miss your bashing in Minstrel, that place is way to friendly now.

Edit: I would love "Adam Oates" in a bag for my team!

[bruins72]

You got some pretty decent players. I got Tarasenko but that certainly didn't give me any sort of advantage. I was the worst in the league in season 1. I barely snuck into the playoffs in season 2. Now it's season 3 and I'm a few games before the 40 game mark, I'm currently 7th in my conference. I'm struggling to maintain that position. I've given up on trying to play defensively. Right now, the only reason I'm where I'm at is because of scoring. We've got the best Goals For in the league by 2 over the Lightning. The Lightning are 2nd in the league and 2nd in their conference. As I said, they've got 145 GF compared to my 147 GF but the big difference is their 93 GA compared to my 126 GA.

You're acting as if everyone else has discovered some secret that lets us all rule at this game. That's not the case. EHM:EA is significantly harder than EHM2007. Some people are better tactically than others. Batdad has always been that way. Nobody is cheating and nobody has an unfair advantage.

[visualdarkness]

I agree that Visual is coming across as a kid who flaps at the floor when he doesn't get what he want.

With that said you have maybe not found an exploit but you have become so good at tinkering with the personal settings that you can get really unrealistic defensive results. Getting those defensive numbers you got in especially the first season is just ridiculous and "proves" that the game has quite a bit to go before it's done. As i've said earlier i think you should try to get in touch with Riz and help him "fix" the tactics part of the game if possible. This is not in any way shape or form criticism toward you just to make that clear, if you found something that clearly works exceptionally well ofcourse you should keep doing it

On the same note Unknown and/or radiskull could do the same when it comes to the offensive part of the game. We all (atleast most of us) want the game to be as realistic as possible so if we consistenly get unrealistic results because of our tactics we should try to fix that if possible. I got some crazy numbers offensively in the Philly challenge but i haven't been able to replicate it in this.

I'm usually the nice guy that doesn't annoy anybody at all (except batdad in Minstrel, but that was fun). So maybe this crying and whining approach is a new strategy in how to approach the game? So far it isn't working and spirals down with all of you hating me.

[visualdarkness]

You're acting as if everyone else has discovered some secret that lets us all rule at this game. That's not the case. EHM:EA is significantly harder than EHM2007. Some people are better tactically than others. Batdad has always been that way. Nobody is cheating and nobody has an unfair advantage.

Time change back to my usual self then, I'm apparently no Tortorella after all, I'm more of a cuddly Krueger.

[stone169]

If there's an exploit, I'd like to know what it is. 5 straight seasons of finishing in the basement so I really don't know why anyone is complaining after starting season 2 so poorly. I'm still going.

Mistake#1 I traded my veterans for picks and prospects who couldn't help me right away.
Mistake#2 I rushed some of young players instead of taking the Red Wings route, which I normally do. A lot of those kids I rushed are no longer with me.
Mistake#3 It wasn't until season 4 that I finally took over Utica and put the staff I wanted there in place.

Once I started putting myself back on track, at the beginning of season 4, things started to turn around for me. My team is by no means great, but Season 4 became my Season 1 and now that I'm in Season 6 my team is battling for a playoff spot. So I look at it this way, I'm in year 3 of my 5 year rebuild and I'm right on track.

[bruins72]

Mistake#3 It wasn't until season 4 that I finally took over Utica and put the staff I wanted there in place.

This is something I used to do all the time but I stopped doing over the last several challenges. I really should take on a more active role with my farm team. My young players will develop better if I did.

[visualdarkness]

I did the complete opposite and traded for win now at the expense of future. As the win now didn't work out I put myself in a really bad position. But hey, I'm an Oilers fan, I know how to fail a rebuild over and over

[batdad]

VIsual-No worries, I knew you were not really lashing out at me. PD-He actually is a pretty good guy from what I know, just having a tough time.

Farm team-I hired everyone up front nad then retired. Then all my guys got hired to the show and I did it again. But I am not sure in EA if they will develop better. IT appears the AI is developing guys better than we are in some cases.

[Peter_Doherty]

I can't get my 1st line (Kreider-Blugers-Jensen) to perform at the start of season 4, atleast my 2nd line is picking up the slack for now. I'll be patient though and just tweak it for a bit, give them atleast the first quarter to sort themselves out. I might switch Centers on my top lines after 10 games to see if that makes a difference.

My PP is also garbage again, i've never had problems with getting a decent PP before, but season 3 and now the start of season 4 and my PP is just horrible.

batdad - I'm sure he is, i understand that he got frustrated, he just went a bit over the top with it

[visualdarkness]

VIsual-No worries, I knew you were not really lashing out at me. PD-He actually is a pretty good guy from what I know, just having a tough time.

Farm team-I hired everyone up front nad then retired. Then all my guys got hired to the show and I did it again. But I am not sure in EA if they will develop better. IT appears the AI is developing guys better than we are in some cases.

Sorry if I took it way too far, but I'm really frustrated at so many things right now that I just needed to vent.

[bruins72]

My wingers seem to be doing all the work. I see my wingers on the scoresheet all the time but my center, no so much. For example, I've had Lazar centering Bartschi and Tarasenko this season. Tarasenko leads the league in goals and points. Bartschi is 4th in the league in points.

Tarasenko: 44 Games 37G 28A 65P +23 14 PIM
Bartschi: 44 Games 25G 30A 55P +22 20 PIM
Lazar: 44 Games 9G 26A 35P +21 12 PIM

That's a big difference. Lazar is just along for the ride.

[Unknown User]

If your having problems with your tactics (winning) try to develop them more in test games like radis said. I'm at the moment tweaking my tactics because I'm still unhappy with a few things like my pp and pk. Take a static game (you have the same starting conditions every time.) and run different tactics on that game over and over. I'm using quick sim on a game and doing it probably 20-50 times until I get consistent results I'm happy with. Like my pp and pk numbers and other team stats I want. Like no one in minus for +/- trying to fix every line so the 3-4 lines arn't always useless etc... If your having these problems that make you finish in the bottom every game you play you should work on some test games trying to figure out the mechanics and tactical settings that work for you on a consistent basis... This would work for player development as well.. See if they have different results in development after running the same game 20 times using different practice setups etc.

[batdad]

IN terms of learning the game Unknown that is an option that people should use. In terms of participating in a challenge, it is cheating IMHO. I do not like that for challenge games-re setting is not something that is kosher to me, IE playing the same game over and over and exiting and coming back. That is poor behaviour IMHO. Not saying you are doing this in the challenge-just saying not the intent of the play of challenges to me. Play it out...you win you win, you lose you do something for the future.

*B72--Same goes for me lately, and now Scheifele injured, He was the one C putting up points for me on a fairly regular basis. ANd noone puts up points for me.

[Unknown User]

I'm talking about a test game not the challenge I play the challenge one game at a time. I use the testing to figure out the game in totally separate games. Usually with a terrible roster and altering the settings and then siming that season multiple times to see what works and what doesn't with out variables changing like different rosters...

[visualdarkness]

Yeah, I never ever replay anything in a challenge as it would feel like I'm cheating. I may suck but I do it cleanly. I'm not cut out to play the same thing over and over for tweaking, in real GMing you never get that chance.

[batdad]

Unknown--I was hoping that.

I do not know if it works though as a blanket. I do not feel that without doing it with the players you are using in any given game that it will work. Have to have the right guys to make any given tactic work. Although my playoffs seem sometimes to have a bit of a formula to them to get the Cup all the time. But...I am playing around constantly to try new things with that as well.

[Asher413]

whuts your own rules? free trading and :
malkin-crosby-okposo and win cup?

Sorry if I wasn't clear- the point of that rant was that I don't think I have the skills to win at EA even if I did have a line like that. But, for the sake of completeness- opened up the trading (Not shooting to be unrealistic and get a Crosby, just get rid of some guys under age and be able to trade down in the draft.)

I also am not coaching the games. That's more so a time issue for me (I don't like the pace of 3 seasons a month which is about the best I can do with watching them). But, It didn't really change the outcome by a lot.

Guys...I DO NOT EVEN FOLLOW WHAT THE MATCH ENGINE SHOWS ME A PLAYER IS DOING> I RELY ON THE NUMBERS TO TELL ME HOW HE IS DOING.

That may save me a lot of stress. It just confused me worse and made less sense.

From the feedback questions- how do you handle the low ratings for guys that don't score? I have Maata in one game that has -1, 1 shot, 1 giveaway and gets a 5? Should I look at the stats more than the rating to find out the 'hidden' stuff going on?

I guess fundamentally I'm frustrated and shouldn't have posted, I just can't believe that I went from average at best in 07 to a blind hockey coach in EA under rules that aren't that different.

[batdad]

Stats--then ratings are pretty much gospels. 5s get moved to bottom of lineup for that game, and often a discipine warning if they have 5 for a whole game.

A 5 in the playoffs...gets benched (or taken off all line combos) after the 2nd period.Goalies get yanked early.

[Peter_Doherty]

11 games in and we are a bit inconsistent but still good (7-1-3), 1st line is getting better and better (Blugers 5+2, Kreider 2+2, Jensen 4+7), PP is up to 18.2% after starting at under 10 after 6 games. My 2nd line (Bärtschi-Bonino-Puljujärvi) was my driving force for the first half and is keeping up the production pretty good. The biggest positive surprise is my 3rd line (Shinkaruk-Samuelsson-Virtanen), they are continuing where they left off in playoffs (Samuelsson instead of Girgensons), Shinkaruk has 11+3, Virtanen 2+8 and Samuelsson 2+5, Shinkaruk is just amazing.

On D we have Lindgren at 1+11 and Kylington at 0+10, both are just insane. On a negative note it looks like Rasmus Andersson isn't really ready, his Av R is really low but since his partner Kylington is doing so great i'll give him some more time.

Edit: Marner is going nuts down in Utica in his second pro season, he has 11+8 in 13 games right now Ryan Orban is also growing into a solid player in his second pro season with 12 points and over 7.50 AvR.

Edit2: Bulgers is almost at PPG now, i tweaked both his line settings, the PP and his individual settings and now he's playing really well

Look at this beast, this is his rookie season

[cstorring]

Wow so Q3 and Q4 really sucked. Players stopped scoring. When we did manage to get a lead we blew it in the 3rd quite a bit. I'm pleased with some prospect development, and Utica should be well stocked this year, but my goal is NOT to finish dead last this year...how ambitious.

At least Utica did very well, lost in game 7 of the conference finals. I had signed a bunch of my S1 picks and sent them to Utica in Round 2, and many of them did a great job stepping right in. Many of them will be there this year, though I'm hoping Crouse will be ready to take the jump to the NHL right away, he's developed well.

The Oilers won the Cup in a 2006 Finals rematch thanks to additions Karri Ramo and Corey Perry and their very good, young D core.

Development of players in

X Ouellet - Easily my best D man in Utica, but got injured at the end of the season and wasn't good at all in the playoffs. Not super happy with his attributes, and there are others who are fighting for an NHL spot ahead of him, and his waver eligibility doesn't help.

E Etem - Traded to FLA for Trocheck, wasn't playing well this season. Both players played fairly well for their new teams.

S Vatanen - My best defencemen. Improved his giveaways by about 100% this year, but couldn't put up as many points on the PP.

M Muller - Had a decent year on the 2nd and 3rd pairings on the Nucks. 18 points, 6.66 rating.

T Rieder - 28 points, 6.57 rating, mostly on 3rd and 4th line usage with minimal PP and PK.

J Szwarz - 23 points, 6.83 rating, surprised me a bit as he was one of our better rated players and was pretty consistent. Threw hits, blocked shots, played PK.

K Dahlbeck - Improved his season from last year in Utica, but nothing outstanding. He'll fight for a bottom pairing spot this year with a few others as he's got decent D attributes and a 16 passing.

H Samuelsson - I want him to be so good. But he's not. 29 points as a mainly 2nd line C with a 6.53 rating. At least he's good at faceoffs and didn't put up 4s and 5s when I put him on PP duty like last year.

T Richard - 16 points, 6.22 rating. Got him for Matthias who spent the year in the AHL and put up mediocre numbers. Pretty good at faceoffs, probably used him more than he should have been used.

E Karlsson - 30 points, 7.06 rating in Utica. He'll be my first call up if I need a 3rd or 4th line winger, his D atts look pretty decent. Got him for Dorsett who played pretty poorly with Carolina and Charlotte.

V Trocheck - 17 points in 36 games, 6.69 rating, 5 of his 8 goals were on the PP. I don't like him playing C but had to move him from RW to C near the end of the year due to injuries and he dried up a bit.

So, now into the offseason, my lineup is looking like

Demko - Markstrom (Demko played poorly in the NHL last year so sent him down to rip up the AHL last year, which he did)

Sbisa - Vatanen
Stanton - Tanev
Some pairing of Weber / Lindgren / Muller / Dahbleck / Tommernes / Ouellet

Bartschi - Bonino - Jensen
Crouse - Samuelsson - Vey (hopefully Crouse can play in the NHL)
Conacher - Trocheck - Reider / Szwarz (Don't like Trocheck here but we'll see how he does)
Kenins / McMillan - Richard - Kassian (Kenins had an excellent post season and deserves a shot finally)
Acton

The Sharks won the lottery and I picked up LD Urho Vaakanainen 2nd overall, though scouts were telling me to go with Goalie Eriksson Ek. Figured I wouldn't have seasons enough to develop a goalie but a D was at least a possibility.

Right, time to start winning.

[CJ]

Look at this beast, this is his rookie season

Good for you!

[batdad]

YOu should see my beast....Marc Olivier Roy.

Got him from the Rangers for Grenier who they promptly waived. Started Roy in the minors....and in his first 15 games down in Utica??? 15-11-26.

I decided to send down Petan and bring this guy up, even though I wanted 5 C because all my guys are young at that position (20, 22,24,24, and Petan at 22)....

He started on 4th line LW only....and I have just moved him to third line for next game. Why???

11 games 4-4-8.

And I still have my other ex Ranger Neubauer down on the farm. His stat line with us 2 games 2-0-2. With the minor league team 26 games 17-18-35. Leads the AHL in goals and points. KID IS 20. Got him in a deal for Yannick Weber.