Project NHL 36 - a 2018-19 DB with 36 Team NHL/AHL/ECHL!

[Ukko]

Also :

I started a game with Quebec, in my home games, the away team has its home colors in the game view, any idea why it happens ?

[BKarchitect]

I’ve noticed the color versus color in game screen from time to time as well. It doesn’t last and the colors are setup correctly in the editor so I can only assume this is a bug in EHM.

[Manimal]

Possible Seattle names? https://www.tsn.ca/report-seattle-nhl-g ... s-1.972946

[Ukko]

Cougars, Eagles, Emeralds, Evergreens, Firebirds, Kraken, Rainiers, Renegades, Sea Lions, Seals, Sockeyes, Totems and Whales.

Dunno which would be best, Kraken is nice, but "real" stuff like Evergreens or Sea Lions would do the job too, imo

[krease]

Hm - so there seems to be an issue changing the salary cap through the EHMAssistant (1.4.1.33) with this DB - attempting to load the rules just comes up blank I made sure I'm looking in the right place by loading up one of my old (non-36-team) saves and making sure that's where I change it.

Checked through the EHM Assistant log and it shows "Competition Rules: 0" (instead of 55 as on my other saves).

Is there an alternate way I can still adjust the salary cap (and/or adjust the other rules)?

EDIT -- I just found the "Editor" instead of the "Assistant", which seems to work find for editing the salary cap/floor

[krease]

If it is the same bug, there are two solutions:

1. Wait until the release of the next version of the Editor and then load and save the database using that version (the upcoming version has the bug fix); or

2. Manually set each non-player's Preferred Tactic attribute to zero. This could be done very quickly by exporting a staff list using the Editor, identifying the affected staff and the importing the relevant staff spreadsheet with the Preferred Tactic set to "Unknown (0)" via the Editor.

1. Is there a new version of the Editor? The latest I've found so far is 0.2.4, dated Dec 3 2017.
2. I've exported the people list via the existing editor, but can't find a 'Preferred Tactic' field. Am I missing something?

[BKarchitect]

FYI the staff should be fixed in v2.5

Archi said he’s close on the new editor a day or two ago.

Make sure you are exporting players and non players selection not just the summary. Staff attributes including preferred tactic are way to the right in the spreadsheet, you’ll have to scroll way over there is a lot of data.

[krease]

FYI the staff should be fixed in v2.5

Archi said he’s close on the new editor a day or two ago.

Make sure you are exporting players and non players selection not just the summary. Staff attributes including preferred tactic are way to the right in the spreadsheet, you’ll have to scroll way over there is a lot of data.

Fixed starting DB is much appreciated, but I am hoping to apply the fix to my existing save, in order to avoid redoing it.

Is the title actually called 'Preferred Tactic'? Because the word 'preferred' doesn't show up in the csv titles. Here's what I'm doing - maybe it's obvious what I'm doing wrong:

- Downloaded Editor v0.2.4
- Load up either my save or the db
- go to 'People' tab, choose 'Players and Staff'
- click 'Export'
- look at the csv - lots of data, no 'Preferred Tactic' (did a Ctrl-F / grep to check)
- Compare rows of known good vs known bad staff - can't find any patterns involving '-1'
- I can see 'Preferred Tactic' in the editor, but it's always set to '[None]', for all non-players I've looked at

[archibalduk]

FYI the staff should be fixed in v2.5

Archi said he’s close on the new editor a day or two ago.

Make sure you are exporting players and non players selection not just the summary. Staff attributes including preferred tactic are way to the right in the spreadsheet, you’ll have to scroll way over there is a lot of data.

Fixed starting DB is much appreciated, but I am hoping to apply the fix to my existing save, in order to avoid redoing it.

Is the title actually called 'Preferred Tactic'? Because the word 'preferred' doesn't show up in the csv titles. Here's what I'm doing - maybe it's obvious what I'm doing wrong:

- Downloaded Editor v0.2.4
- Load up either my save or the db
- go to 'People' tab, choose 'Players and Staff'
- click 'Export'
- look at the csv - lots of data, no 'Preferred Tactic' (did a Ctrl-F / grep to check)
- Compare rows of known good vs known bad staff - can't find any patterns involving '-1'
- I can see 'Preferred Tactic' in the editor, but it's always set to '[None]', for all non-players I've looked at

No, you need to go to Tools -> Export Spreadsheet (if using v0.2.4) or File -> Export Spreadsheet (if using v0.2.5+ to be released today).

[krease]

No, you need to go to Tools -> Export Spreadsheet (if using v0.2.4) or File -> Export Spreadsheet (if using v0.2.5+ to be released today).

Ahh, Got it!

- Exported "Players & Non-Players" and trying to reimport with no changes - error about missing identifier in A1
- Exported "Players & Non-Players (Research Sheet)" and doing the same - seems to work
- Changed relevant data and reimporting the csv worked ok - 'Save as a saved game' seems to go ok
-- loading based on that saved game seems to give some errors though:
--- "STAFF_RECORDS::load_from_disk() : cannot read club history info table"
--- "TRAINING_MANAGER::load_from_disk() : cannot read players array"

End result so far:
- game seems to continue loading, though a bunch of features are missing. Did a search for the affected staff in-game and they're no longer cause crashes -- but the save is very unstable and broken in many other ways
- "save as DB" again seems to work from the Editor, but can't make it past the league selection screen without crashing.

Bleh. I feel like I've just jumped into the deep end with only a cursory understanding of water.

Will spend some more time fiddling with it before giving up, but as before, if there's anything obvious that I am missing or should try, please let me know

EDIT:
- Just to see if it works - Trying to do the export-fix-import thing (replace "[None]" with "Unknown (0)" in the "TacticPreferred" column) on top of a copy of the database directly (instead of a game save), but even a new game from that db gives me errors afterwards: "generate_extra_non_playing_staff() - coach not found in coach list"...it'll let me play at least a few days afterwards just fine (just did a basic smoke test).

EDIT 2:
- Just tried the new 2.5 editor. Zero staff problems doing the 'open database -> resave database" route - also noted the warning about not overwriting save files Tried it anyways - 'open-resave' didn't help, but open-modifyAffectedStaffJob-save does seem to work without obvious issues...

Super kudos to you guys putting in all this work on these tools & helping the community here - going to spend some more time playing now

[nashmc]

Thank you very much for your hard work BKarchitect !!!
This project is awesome, and encouraged me to buy the game to be honest . Sooo many memories came back since I've played the game a decade ago for hours.
I'm a huge fan of reorganising leagues through expansion in any US sport and your ideas are brilliant, and here comes my question. Is it technically possible to create 40 teams league? I mean 40 for each NHL/AHL/ECHL. Since there are so many talented players I think it would make the game more intriguing after first 2-3 seasons when the teams settle.
Looking forward for your reply!

[BKarchitect]

Absolutely 40 is possible - the hard part is just creating the schedule. I believe we started having errors trying to get the NCAA to work as one league around the 49-50 team mark so that’s probably about the limit.

I’ve got no plans for “NHL40” in the works but anybody who wants to try for it is free to use NHL36 as a starting point. You’ll really have to map out conference and divisional alignments, determine scheduling and then research how to put together a schedule template. Certainly is doable though.

[nashmc]

Then I would try to create it, taking your brilliant job as starting point. Especially that I couldn't resign on any classic expansion to put the Portland Badgers. I will start with the map. Any advice how to setup the calendar, should I use the alpha editor in order to do it?
I'll check on later to show the results, if you don't mind

[nashmc]

Greetings,
especially to You BKarchitect!
I didn't threw the idea in the air and I am actually at the last stage of creating 40 teams project. I used full 3 days and some parts of the nights of my sick leave. Now I can imagine how hard was your work.
The first day was thrown away for rearaging the league, especially focusing on affiliations changes and for searching ideas and background research as I have never been to USA and needed to fill this gap of my knowledge.
Second day was mainly graphics like creating the logos, actually adjusting others work and re-touching some of those brilliant ideas.
Here is the first part of result:
2 conferences, 4 divisions each, 5 teams per division. There were some tough decisions to make.


WESTERN CONFERENCE
South-west Division: Anaheim Ducks, Arizona Coyotes, LA Kings, SJ Sharks, Vegas Golden Knights
North-West Division: Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers, Portland Beavers, Seattle Kraken, Vancouver Canucks
South Division: Colorado Avalanche, Dallas Stars, Houston Aeros, KC Scouts, St. Louis Bluez
North-central Division: Chicago Blackhawks, Milwaukee Admirals, Minnesota Wild, Saskatoon Whitetails, Winnipeg Jets

EASTERN CONFERENCE
South-east Division: Atlanta Thrashers, Carolina Hurricanes, Florida Panthers, Nashville Predators, Tampa Bay Lightning
Central Division: Buffalo Sabres, Cincinnati Stingers, Columbus BlueJackets, Detroit Red Wings, Pittsburgh Pennguins
Eastcoast Division: NJ Devils, NY Islanders, NY Rangers, Philadelphia Flyers, Washington Capitals
North-east Division: Boston Bruins, Montreal Canadiens, Ottawa Senators, Quebec Nordiques, Toronto Maple Leafs


The project database is nearly done. The only thing I haven't done yet is the calendar... I'm afraid to start it even, because I don't know how. Any help would be nice!
Next update I'll show te affiliations changes and maps of AHL teams and ECHL teams. I'm still thinking of reactivating the SPHL but didn't do anything in that matter yet.
How do you like it BKarchitect?

[ElPayaso]

What has happened to Nick Ritchie? Skating, puckhandling and passing all between 5 and 8?! The guy is a decent skater and his stickhandling and passing/playmaking is definitely above average. I figured he needed some downgrading since he was too much of an offensive force in-game but surely he could have been lowered in other (more realistic) areas?

[BKarchitect]

What has happened to Nick Ritchie? Skating, puckhandling and passing all between 5 and 8?! The guy is a decent skater and his stickhandling and passing/playmaking is definitely above average. I figured he needed some downgrading since he was too much of an offensive force in-game but surely he could have been lowered in other (more realistic) areas?

I'll look at his profile; often when a player's CA is reduced, the computer will kind of take liberties as to which ratings to reduce to streamline their individual ratings to fit that overall CA profile.

More than happy to look at a few wacky player ratings here and there like this one with Ritchie but let me re-iterate that (if you read the first page of the project) that having constant debates about individual ratings of individuals players is not my goal here. There is an editor and there are other databases, two of which (TBL and xECK) are based on an actual 31-team setup. People are free to use both. I mean - this is a 36 team database - so it's not real to begin with (even though I do want it to feel realistic).

[BKarchitect]

Looks fun, nashmc. Could definitely be a trip to play once you have it all setup - 40 teams will really make things wild.

The scheduling will be the hardest part by far. I don't really have any sage advise other than it's going to take a while...there's no automated process I've found that works. Also don't forget to do a second template for alternate (Olympic) years!

[connormcjesus]

I found a weird bug where all of my players have a "non-playing profile" tab which shows me all their coaching attributes.

[nashmc]

I'm basically very close to reach alpha version with the schedule included but I don't know what does the year offset mean? Can you help me BKarchitect?

[archibalduk]

I found a weird bug where all of my players have a "non-playing profile" tab which shows me all their coaching attributes.

It sounds like you have edited the saved game (which is highly inadvisable).

I'm basically very close to reach alpha version with the schedule included but I don't know what does the year offset mean? Can you help me BKarchitect?

Year offset means in relation to the game start date. So for the NHL season, everything prior to 1 January has a zero Year Offset. From 1 January until the end of the season, the Year Offset is 1.

[connormcjesus]

I edited the database instead of the save game, just to change a couple of expansion teams and realign the divisions so some rivalries were intact and the time zones made sense. Still a bad idea?

[archibalduk]

I edited the database instead of the save game, just to change a couple of expansion teams and realign the divisions so some rivalries were intact and the time zones made sense. Still a bad idea?

It's not a bad idea, but if you don't get it correct then you can get seemingly unrelated issues (I have encountered weird issues when I got part of a structure wrong). Assuming the players do not have non-player profiles when viewing the DB in the Editor then it'll most likely be a structure issue.

[thegreaterikku]

This is what made me love EHM again. Thanks a lot. Anyway you can add again the draft file? Not the import one but the one where you do manually? Thanks.

[BKarchitect]

Thanks! I'll probably have a 2.6 update soon and I'll re-link the manual draft file.

The NHL32 Seattle project is paused until I can figure out what is going on with the draft lottery. NHL36 doesn't have that bug.

[MJalove]

Bk love the 36 team league. I was able to swap out Milwaukee and Saskatchewan for Hartford and Halifax and can't put the game down. Thanks for all the hard work.