NCAA - League settings & feedback

[BKarchitect]

Hi all, thought this might be worthy of its own topic - if not go ahead and fold into the editing structures thread.

I've done a lot of work in the past week and have a working NCAA (Division 1) model up to speed. In fact - I'm working on two different paths and I hope to have the second model up to speed as well this weekend...and we can have some debate as to the better model to use going forward.

MODEL 1 (the working one you will see below): The Conferences as Leagues Model:
PROS
- You can customize each league rule setting which is useful as not all conferences have the same rules.
- It emphasizes conference play. Well, you can only have conference play in this model (until the Frozen Four). Since automatic bids to the real NCAA tournament are based on conference champions, I do feel conference play is more important than non-conference games.
- Nice little perks like customized graphics for each conference (since each one is a league), news items for winning teams from each conference, etc. For history, you can look up conference winners and runners-up in each conference but then also look up the NCAA title winners for that competition.
- The six conference champions move on to the NCAA Division 1 Ice Hockey Championships which turns into a Frozen Four which then turns into the NCAA title game. It's a similar setup to the CHL Memorial Cup as it is its own league that draws conference winners from the 6 conferences.
- Flexibility at setup to choose leagues individually...or just choose the NCAA Championships and it will automatically seelcted the six conferences because they are linked to it.
CONS
- No non-conference games. These cannot be scheduled as far as I can tell. So all regular season games are 100% only against teams in your conference (league).
- Stats are conference based...you can cycle through the conferences to see all the statistical leaders but there is no way to have a composite NCAA stats board.
- The NCAA Championship works great and gives you the feel of the Frozen Four but obviously is not accurate to real life in setup. In real life, it's a 16 game, partially-seeded playoff tournament. From what I can tell, I can only bring each conference winner over to this competition so that is 6 teams. I can get 7 by having a random linked league team host (like the Memorial Cup) but that really accomplishes nothing except add an undeserving team. So the NCAA Championship is setup to a single, round robin format for stage 1 (like Memorial Cup) but then differs from the Memorial Cup in that the 4 highest seeds are then simply moved on to the overall national playoff semi-final (Frozen Four).

Things I have done a bit differently for this setup:
- NCAA teams play between 29 games (Ivy Schools) and 38 games per year total, including non-conference games. Conferences play between 22-28 conference games. This structure allows me to vary games played by conference and not have it matter because to make the NCAA Championships you only have to win your conference. However, for the sake of statistical comparisons, I have setup each conference (league) to play 34 games. This makes college stats comparisons between the conferences in this setup more relevant. Each team plays 17 home and 17 road conference games.
- I have structured games to fall completely on Friday and Saturdays where 90% of real life college games are played, with the appropriate breaks around Thanksgiving and December/January. Almost all college games are actually played as two game sets to reduce travel. I have not yet done this - and probably won't. You still get the feel and length and rhythm of the real college season.
- Rules are not yet fine-tuned to each particular league. Haven't added training camp either which I mean to do for each conference.
- Conference Alignment: Notre Dame has been moved to the Big Ten where they will start play next year (from Hockey East) while Arizona State still doesn't have a conference but have been moved to the NCHC, where they applied (but were rejected) last summer. I still think they could end up there though. If something more firm comes up, I will modify them accordingly.

MODEL 2 (work in progress): The Conferences as Divisions Model
PROS
- This is where the entire structure is one league, with conferences as divisions and the NCAA tournament as a 16-team playoff.
- Allows for non-conference games. I'm working on a schedule matrix that will still be heavy on conference games like real life but will include a lot of non-conference games at the beginning of the year. This will make for some more interesting matchups but you'll still get a higher dose of conference games.
- Allows for standings and stats to be sorted by overall NCAA - which gives you a way to compare teams/players at once. The league screen will essentially show the overall rankings of all 60 teams and then if you go to standings by division, you can see the conference (division) standings.
- The whole thing is a bit streamlined; you would only need to click one league at the setup screen to activate the entire model.
- Sixteen team playoff more accurately reflects the structure of the actual NCAA Championships, with the semi-final round being the Frozen Four.
CONS
- You lose the graphical interface of each conference...it's simply the "NCAA Division 1" and you get the NCAA logo and all the teams but not the customized feel of each conference as a league. So in the NHL draft screen, you also don't see what conference the player is from, you just get the team and a little NCAA logo.
- You lose the ability to track conference champions; because in this setup, they are merely division winners.
- You lose the ability for custom rules and schedules for each conference. While I chose to have all teams play 34 games in Model 1 - in this model, you have to have all teams play the same number of games because otherwise entering teams into the playoffs (NCAA Championships) by points with different amount of games played makes no sense.
- Sixty teams at once can be a little overwhelming in terms of size as you sort through standings and statistics.

Issues with BOTH types of models:
- Ok - this is a BIG one I have not yet figured out. I can't figure out how to actually sign players (recruits). I have the leagues/conferences set as IIHF (no transfer) so that teams don't trade (there is no trading in the NCAA). The computer will still add recruits to NCAA teams - either by way of preset transfers in the editors or kind of randomly like it always has based on the reputation of the team and recruit (from the likes of the USHL, High School and Canadian Jr A leagues). But you can't control it as of now.
- If you have EHM add fake players, those initial fake players are not given real 4 year contracts. It will add a bunch of players, some who are 18 or 19 but then just randomly leave after the first year. This issue does not seem to affect fake players later on who are actually recruited/signed by NCAA teams - those players will continue to behave like real recruits with 4 years of eligibility...it's only the first batch of fake players if you add them to start to fill out team rosters.
- Speaking of team rosters - in my DB, I have made sure every single team (60 in total) has at least around 12 real players and most have more like 18-20. I haven't checked the TBL set, those may be even beefier so I suggest not using fake players at the start if you really want the NCAA to appear more accurately unless your DB has only like a couple players per team.

Screenshots to follow...

[Named]

Players leave randomly in most of all new EHM leagues. That problem should be solved by Riz I mentioned months ago. Too much of them leave. I think You should focus on model 2 as it will be closer to IRL model.

[BKarchitect]

MODEL 1 SCREENSHOTS

[Primis]

I have not tackled this in EHM 1. I *have*, however, tackled this in 2007, on a smaller scale:

http://www.ehmtheblueline.com/forums/vi ... aa#p159839

The problem I had there was of course with NHL teams signing my guys away and then not playing them. Recruiting is non-existent obviously, you just had to sign free agents the right age and "beat" junior teams to them. I kept trying to find a way to sign guys to 4-year contracts but.... it never materialized. That said... it was a fun save for a few seasons.

I think I personally would lean towards Model #2. Non-conference games are a big requirement, and being able to see an overview of all NCAA is a big deal also IMHO.

I'd be very excited to play a file like this though, especially if you, or we, or whoever can figure out how to force 4-year contracts.

[archibalduk]

I was looking through the Transfer Rules -> Extra Rules screen to see if there is a way of setting a minimum contract length. It seems there isn't, but there is a "Contract Max Length" setting. I'm going to be reporting to Riz a couple of DB/game bugs I've come across and will ask whether it is possible for a Contract Minimum Length setting to be added to the Extra Rules. I think setting both of the Min and Max to 4 would do what you're looking for.

Btw - this is really outstanding work!

[sensaa]

I would say Model 2 too!

Awesome work btw, im doing some research too for the NCAA and the biggest problem i have i should say is the roster and signing too.

That mean i should add real players to the database for newly created team i guess because they lose pretty quickly the fake players added by the game and don't sign anyone so teams from the big10 i just switched dominate the league because they have a full roster already in place

[Primis]

I was looking through the Transfer Rules -> Extra Rules screen to see if there is a way of setting a minimum contract length. It seems there isn't, but there is a "Contract Max Length" setting. I'm going to be reporting to Riz a couple of DB/game bugs I've come across and will ask whether it is possible for a Contract Minimum Length setting to be added to the Extra Rules. I think setting both of the Min and Max to 4 would do what you're looking for.

That would be great if Riz could add that in somehow for contracts.

I also wonder if there's a way to make an NHL signing window of sorts for NCAA. Because NHL teams technically can't/won't do that midseason, because it involves the player unenrolling from school. Or can we use a pre-existing signing window and tack it on to NCAA (like a European signing window?). Because if you could eliminate NHL teams stealing NCAA guys midseason, it'd change the playability by a lot. It *has* happened in the past before but... NHL teams don't usually consider it worth angering the NCAA system/schools/fans and have the prospects wait at least until their NCAA season has ended.

I haven't really been that jazzed to play EHM much lately, but the prospect of playable NCAA without fudging and kludging it as badly as I did in the past honestly has got me very interested again.

[BKarchitect]

Just a little update on Method 2 (the entire 60-team NCAA as one league with the real conferences as divisions):

I've had continual problems with a crash and I am 99.9% sure I've isolated the issue. Problem is, I don't think there's anything I can do about it.

The 60-team setup crashes EVERY time the day that the "Season Preview" is released (I somehow scrolled past it in the news box below but trust me, that's the day and last news article preview that appears when it crashes, every time):



When I trim the NCAA structure down to 30 teams, I don't get the crash and everything works fine. Ergo - I think there is something in the coding for that news story that can't "handle" 60 teams (or a certain number of teams above a restricted number). It's like it reads there are 60 teams but the new article coding doesn't allow for that many to be displayed. Not sure how to solve this. Has anybody tried a league with that many teams?

[BKarchitect]

Yup...just tried with 41 teams (4 of the conferences) and is still worked but when I added a 5th conference and got to 50 teams - crash every time at the Season Preview news article and no ability to move past that point.

[Primis]

It's entirely possible there's a value greater than 30 that's possible without crashing, but I was surprised when you said 60 teams before because I would have thought that would crash. Maybe something like 40 is the max. I can't imagine it's a 30 team max, not with Riz knowing NHL expansion was looming.

But maybe the solution is a Method 3, with 2 leagues instead of one? Put Atlantic, ECAC, Hockey East in one, and Big Ten, NCHC and WCHA in the other? Is there an option for a stage where the divisional champs of the 2 leagues go on to a playoff, or something like that? Just a thought. I don't know how hard it'd be to link 2 leagues like that.

[BKarchitect]

Yeah, obviously somewhere between 42 and 50 it fails.

Interestingly, when I have the NCAA on "View" only (not enhanced), I still get the error but I can cycle past it after pressing it a few times and the game continues as normal and you can actually watch the NCAA season proceed. Given some of the flaws with contracts and signings that I haven't been able to workaround yet - simply being able to view a "realistic" 60-team NCAA model but not play it may be as good as we can hope for at the moment. You can still watch the games, you can still see historical league results and stats and still have a pretty realistic 16-team NCAA playoff tournament.

Better than nothing for now, I think. Still working on getting a realistic non-conference/conference schedule template for the entire league going though. I have one but I'm getting crashing errors with it at the moment.

P.S> My boy Tyson Jost killing it

[BKarchitect]

It's entirely possible there's a value greater than 30 that's possible without crashing, but I was surprised when you said 60 teams before because I would have thought that would crash. Maybe something like 40 is the max. I can't imagine it's a 30 team max, not with Riz knowing NHL expansion was looming.

But maybe the solution is a Method 3, with 2 leagues instead of one? Put Atlantic, ECHC, Hockey East in one, and Big Ten, NCHC and WCHA in the other? Is there an option for a stage where the divisional champs of the 2 leagues go on to a playoff, or something like that? Just a thought. I don't know how hard it'd be to link 2 leagues like that.

You can do a memorial cup setup like I did with the conferences as 6 different leagues but you lose that nice realistic 16 team tournament and you can't crossover games between leagues....so I guess in the hybrid method you could have some non conference games but I think the history would be a bit odd as would having a two team final between "NCAA east" and "NCAA west" leagues.

Hmmm...I wonder if the CHL (euro version) has any applications on here? I see it is continental based with teams by flags but I can't figure out how it decides what teams.

[Named]

Teams are chosen for CHL by A, B, C Licenses sets in Clubs screen in Editor. Made a save with error and post, upload it on SI.

[PeakyBlinder]

Hey don't mean to be annoying, but where y'all at with the NCAA?

[BKarchitect]

The best I can do is Model 1 - each conference as it's own league - with a playoff in each league and then the 6 conference champs participating in a Memorial Cup-style round robin and eventual Frozen Four playoff. Model 2 (one NCAA league with multiple divisions as the conferences and a 16 team playoff) is not currently attainable because the amount of teams in the league (60 Division 1 NCAA teams) causes there to be an error/crash when the league hits the season preview (see above).

Furthermore - contracts are still not really do-able as a user controlled GM of an NCAA team. As mentioned in above posts, the clubs will still gain commits somewhat randomly (as in the default database when the NCAA is simply a background league) but I haven't figured out how to make it controllable with accurate 4-year contracts.

That said - it's still nice to have the NCAA's at even as "view only" at this point. You can watch conference standings, stats and tactics are developed like a full-blown league, you can watch games, histories are developed and, even if the route is a little inaccurate, you still end up having essentially a Frozen Four each year. In my roster, I've gone ahead and fleshed out all 60 teams with updated rosters of 22-30 players each so stats (like ice time and lines) and tactics are realistic. It also let's me not have to turn on extra "fake" players who are generated with unrealistic contracts. That said, roster sizes tend to vary as you sim forward since there is no actual draft to keep every single team fully stocked.

So long story short - a fully, accurately "playable" NCAA is still not possible IMO.

[Primis]

Would you be willing to release a DB with a Model 1? I've been fiddling around with playable leagues (fictional and real), but I never did anything with NCAA when I saw you working on it. I'd like to fiddle with it still, and I suspect I'm not the only one.

[BKarchitect]

Yeah no problem - here it is. Let me know if you are able to advance anything such as the contracts.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/5k03d5ou83nd6 ... 2.rar?dl=0

[Alessandro]

The best I can do is Model 1 - each conference as it's own league - with a playoff in each league and then the 6 conference champs participating in a Memorial Cup-style round robin and eventual Frozen Four playoff. Model 2 (one NCAA league with multiple divisions as the conferences and a 16 team playoff) is not currently attainable because the amount of teams in the league (60 Division 1 NCAA teams) causes there to be an error/crash when the league hits the season preview (see above).

Furthermore - contracts are still not really do-able as a user controlled GM of an NCAA team. As mentioned in above posts, the clubs will still gain commits somewhat randomly (as in the default database when the NCAA is simply a background league) but I haven't figured out how to make it controllable with accurate 4-year contracts.

That said - it's still nice to have the NCAA's at even as "view only" at this point. You can watch conference standings, stats and tactics are developed like a full-blown league, you can watch games, histories are developed and, even if the route is a little inaccurate, you still end up having essentially a Frozen Four each year. In my roster, I've gone ahead and fleshed out all 60 teams with updated rosters of 22-30 players each so stats (like ice time and lines) and tactics are realistic. It also let's me not have to turn on extra "fake" players who are generated with unrealistic contracts. That said, roster sizes tend to vary as you sim forward since there is no actual draft to keep every single team fully stocked.

So long story short - a fully, accurately "playable" NCAA is still not possible IMO.

Care to share your roster work for our TBL rosters?

[BKarchitect]

Sure use whatever you think can be helpful. I've taken it as far as I can, I think!

[Alessandro]

Sure use whatever you think can be helpful. I've taken it as far as I can, I think!

Do you have skype so that we can write each other there?

[Alessandro]

Talking about your attempt... I think the only thing is that it seems you can sign only free agents. I tried to add a transfer period to the Big Ten, but you can only buy players off other college teams. You can't recruit off USHL, for example.
Maybe this is why you think it's unplayable?

[Primis]

Talking about your attempt... I think the only thing is that it seems you can sign only free agents. I tried to add a transfer period to the Big Ten, but you can only buy players off other college teams. You can't recruit off USHL, for example.
Maybe this is why you think it's unplayable?

Having only had a teeny little bit of time with it, I'm pretty impressed with what I see.

I'm honestly not sure why you can't sign guys off USHL teams. I would assume (haven't looked yet) that extends to not being able to sign off high school teams as well. That's tough though because it sure looks like the AI NCAA teams can still recruit/sign from those leagues. I wonder if the problem isn't a setting with the NCAA leagues, but with the USHL/HS ones? Is it just the age overlap? Actually, poking around... there is no age range set for the NCAA leagues? There probably should be. I realize technically there isn't in real life, but realistically you're not really getting any guys above 24 years old, it's mainly 18-23 years. Maybe need those flags in under Extra Rules.

The 4 year "contracts" and everything though.... it looks pretty good. If we can hash out the USHL/HS signing thing, I don't really know that there's any big problem with the rest of the model or structure. The tournament/Frozen Four thing is a very minor thing IMHO. It's maybe not 100% accurate, but it'd be VERY playable and a unique experience. I'm really looking forward to digging into this more. This might also be a good springboard to then get the CIS and say the BCHL playable as well....

[sensaa]

My NCAA league attempt have 48 Teams and i'm not getting any error with the season preview, so it's strange thats it happen at 60

[Alessandro]

I'm honestly not sure why you can't sign guys off USHL teams.

Must be something hardcoded, like why you can't approach CHL players with european teams...
I am getting a few commitments though simming with a human manager. And you can still sign free agents.
I think it would make for a great challenge. And yes probably we need to set a 24 top age.

[BKarchitect]

My NCAA league attempt have 48 Teams and i'm not getting any error with the season preview, so it's strange thats it happen at 60

Somewhere between 48 and 60 it always creates an error in the news item "season preview". Do you mind tryIng to add more teams to see if it affects your version?