EHM The Blue Line

Ok, so perhaps I send one scout out to watch the OHL for 3 month. When I get his report I see that he has found interesting players playing in say Erie and Ottawa then I can send one scout to each team for 2 month to get more accurate assessments.

Exactly! If you thought that Erie and Ottawa had several players that you wanted closer looks at, you could send a scout to each to get a closer look at them. Alternatively, if they each had one player that you were really interested in, you could send a scout watch each of those players for a month and still get moderate detail/moderate accuracy reports on the other players on their team (in just one month as opposed to two months). It makes it so there is some strategy in scouting.

bruins72 wrote:It makes it so there is some strategy in scouting.

I agree.

dabo wrote:

bruins72 wrote:It makes it so there is some strategy in scouting.

I agree.

Strategy in Scouting.

bruins72 wrote:Exactly! If you thought that Erie and Ottawa had several players that you wanted closer looks at, you could send a scout to each to get a closer look at them. Alternatively, if they each had one player that you were really interested in, you could send a scout watch each of those players for a month and still get moderate detail/moderate accuracy reports on the other players on their team (in just one month as opposed to two months). It makes it so there is some strategy in scouting.

It depends how it's executed. If all your doing is sending a guy to Ottawa, and he gives you projections in the form of numbers and you pick the guys with the numbers you like best and say: I want a closer look at these ones...then I don't understand how that's strategy. To me, strategy involves there being a variety of right choices, but you're limited to picking one.

The alternative of simply sending a scout at players that you have an interest in, well it depends what sparks that interest. If your interest is based on their performance, then it's not really strategy either because you're merely following up on the league leaders in a certain category. For example, it's not strategy if you saw Tavares tearing through the minors, so you pointed a scout his way. If anything, that's so obvious it should be automatic.

I think there needs to be a way to find hidden gems that isn't guess work and it's not a matter of pure number crunching. The reason why I don't think it should be a matter of number crunching is because anyone can do that. Now there can be an aspect of that, where you try and find players who have done something interesting under bad circumstances (say a player whose done well despite having poor linemates), but there has to be that extra variable there that makes the entire process worth engaging in.

The way I'd do scouting is so that you don't have to focus on the top-30/50 selections at all. Scouts should know to track those guys on their own and come draft day, you should have their recommendations on those guys without even asking. Scouting should be the art of finding diamonds in the rough, so that when the third+ rounds comes, you have a list of guys you want.

Which, incidently, would address another complaint I've seen with other games: too often the third+ rounds are meaningless, when that's not necessarily the case in the NHL. Detroit has built their team partially through amazing scouting that focused in on guys they could grab in the later rounds.

I never mentioned anything about just watching a player's numbers to decide who to take a closer look at.

Here is an example of what I see (using my current season's team from the Challenge)...

I send a scout to watch the OHL for 3 months. I get a low detail/moderate accuracy scouting reports on all the players the scout sees on this trip. This equates to the part of the EHM scouting report that says the projected role, ie Skilled Forward First Line Potential, and the player projection, ie Like Nathan Horton with a slower stride. Based off of these reports, I can then think about players I might want to take a look at. Let's say I'm an NHL team and I'm looking like I'm going to finish middle of the pack. Brett Ritchie of the Sarnia Sting is ranked #12 by the ISS and I could use a RW prospect. I could just send a scout to watch him and get a closer look at him but I also notice that Garrett Meurs and Shayne Campbell of the Sting are also ranked in the draft. I decide to send a scout to watch the team. I could send him for 1 month and get back a moderate detail/better accuracy report on every player on that team. That would cover 3 draft eligible players. Or if I really didn't want to look too closely at Meurs and Campbell, I could send the scout there just to watch Ritchie for 1 month and still get a moderate detail/moderate accuracy report on those two guys while getting a best detail/best accuracy report on Ritchie, who might be my first round pick. That's just one way of looking at it. There are many different combinations of ways you can send your scouts out to evaluate talent.

BTW...

Low Detail Report = Projected Career Role and Player Projection
Moderate Detail Report = Same as low detail report but also including the letter grades from the Report Card in the current EHM's scouting report.
Best Detail Report = Letter grades or actual numbers for individual attributes.

bruins72 wrote:I never mentioned anything about just watching a player's numbers to decide who to take a closer look at.

Here is an example of what I see (using my current season's team from the Challenge)...

I send a scout to watch the OHL for 3 months. I get a low detail/moderate accuracy scouting reports on all the players the scout sees on this trip. This equates to the part of the EHM scouting report that says the projected role, ie Skilled Forward First Line Potential, and the player projection, ie Like Nathan Horton with a slower stride. Based off of these reports, I can then think about players I might want to take a look at. Let's say I'm an NHL team and I'm looking like I'm going to finish middle of the pack. Brett Ritchie of the Sarnia Sting is ranked #12 by the ISS and I could use a RW prospect. I could just send a scout to watch him and get a closer look at him but I also notice that Garrett Meurs and Shayne Campbell of the Sting are also ranked in the draft. I decide to send a scout to watch the team. I could send him for 1 month and get back a moderate detail/better accuracy report on every player on that team. That would cover 3 draft eligible players. Or if I really didn't want to look too closely at Meurs and Campbell, I could send the scout there just to watch Ritchie for 1 month and still get a moderate detail/moderate accuracy report on those two guys while getting a best detail/best accuracy report on Ritchie, who might be my first round pick. That's just one way of looking at it. There are many different combinations of ways you can send your scouts out to evaluate talent.

BTW...

Low Detail Report = Projected Career Role and Player Projection
Moderate Detail Report = Same as low detail report but also including the letter grades from the Report Card in the current EHM's scouting report.
Best Detail Report = Letter grades or actual numbers for individual attributes.

While that's not numbers, I still think it's the same theme. You get your low-detail report and then you pick the better players from that report to get a moderately detailed one of either the players or the team (if there's multiple good players on that team). I just don't see the skill involved because it still sounds like going through the motions.

Like I said, if Brett Ritchie is ranked #12 overall, then you should automatically get a detailed report on him. It's obvious that you'd have at least a passing interest in the top 30 ISS ranked players. Yes, you'll have a personal preference based on what positions your after, but that's not a big enough factor when you're talking about at least scouting the best of the best (NHL clubs scout them anyways because they want to prepare for every eventuality, ie- trades before or during the draft).

The only part where I'd be interest in getting more in-depth about the top 30 guys is with interviews. Of the top 30 ISS ranked guys, you can choose to interview 5 of them and you can pick (for each of them), say 5 questions (out of however many that's in the database) and they'll provide answers designed to give you insight on what type of player they'll develop into. That, I think, is more legitiment because that's at least something that real GMs do directly. It's not strategic for you to tell your scouts to keep an eye on the best of the best. However, when Edmonton was debating between Seguin and Hall, it was ultimately the interviews that tipped the balance towards Hall. Likewise, other teams can select the potential first rounders they like the most (appropriate to their position in the draft) and interview them.

I think the strategy/challenge is choosing where to scout and how thoroughly. Unlike NHL:EHM I want to make it so that you cannot have perfect assessments of players from all over the world, there won't be time nor resources for that.

BTerran wrote: The only part where I'd be interest in getting more in-depth about the top 30 guys is with interviews. Of the top 30 ISS ranked guys, you can choose to interview 5 of them and you can pick (for each of them), say 5 questions (out of however many that's in the database) and they'll provide answers designed to give you insight on what type of player they'll develop into. That, I think, is more legitiment because that's at least something that real GMs do directly. It's not strategic for you to tell your scouts to keep an eye on the best of the best. However, when Edmonton was debating between Seguin and Hall, it was ultimately the interviews that tipped the balance towards Hall. Likewise, other teams can select the potential first rounders they like the most (appropriate to their position in the draft) and interview them.

While I don't agree with the rest of your take on scouting, I do like this part.

I really like bruins72 system. It's looks great. I'd like to combine it with BTerran suggestion to have the game automatically take you to the scout screen when the scout has finished his latest assignment.

It'd be like "Hey boss I just finished looking at the OHL, here are my findings. What should I do next?" Then you select your choice, or maybe a wait option if you're waiting for some other scouting reports to come in before reassigning him.

One suggestion I'd like to make is a scouting shortlist made of players you see throughout the year that interest you. If a scout is watching a game and a player(s) on your scouting shortlist are in the game then he pays some extra attention to them and you get a bonus to detail. And of course I'd like to have that shortlist available for the draft itself. Maybe it can have the ability to rank players so I can just go down my list when my pick comes up. I've always wanted a draft list in EHM.

empach wrote: One suggestion I'd like to make is a scouting shortlist made of players you see throughout the year that interest you. If a scout is watching a game and a player(s) on your scouting shortlist are in the game then he pays some extra attention to them and you get a bonus to detail. And of course I'd like to have that shortlist available for the draft itself. Maybe it can have the ability to rank players so I can just go down my list when my pick comes up. I've always wanted a draft list in EHM.

I really like both of these ideas!

Have a shortlist of players that you're watching and maybe scouts on league-wide searches only might pay extra attention to them and provide you with moderate detail instead of low detail?

I definitely want a draft list/draft board. You can rank players in their importance to you. When your pick comes up, in addition to showing you the remaining players available, maybe show the next 5 players on your draft board when your pick comes up? I always seems to have a guy I'm interested in for the 3rd round but that might not be ranked to go around then and I forget about him. This also happens with unranked players that I like. I forget they're there and miss picking them.

dabo wrote:I think the strategy/challenge is choosing where to scout and how thoroughly. Unlike NHL:EHM I want to make it so that you cannot have perfect assessments of players from all over the world, there won't be time nor resources for that.

But what would lead you to choose one place over another? Is it merely a matter of more thoroughly scouting the places that are best known for their hockey talent or - in the case of the OHL for example - scouting the best teams? Like I said before, that just doesn't feel interesting to me unless there's that second variable there.

Maybe my problem is that I've been explaining my idea as an extreme when it could be a modification on the existing method you guys are planning on using. Let's use the example of Russia and Germany. The obvious choice is to scout Russia and the game should tell you that. However, their should also be a second variable (diamonds in the rough or whatever). In Russia the odds of finding a single diamond in the rough player is, say 2% over a three month scouting trip (because it's so overscouted). However, if you scout Germany, you're less likely to get information on superstars, but you have, say a 15% chance of finding a diamond in the rough. At the end of the trip, your scouts highlight the player (who is projected to be, say fourth round or later picks in the draft) and give you a detailed report on them. Maybe your scout ends up saying that he thinks he could be a second-line winger. That may not always be accurate, but now you have a name to target in the later rounds of the draft. Same with the OHL. You can scout the team that has a Tavares-level talent, but maybe there's an underrated talent in a bad team.

So now scouting is a balancing act between sending your scouts to places where you can learn more about the blue chip prospects or sending scouts to places where you're more likely to find those 3rd+ round gems.

Maybe that's your intent already and I'm just misinterupting it, but that's something I'd like to see scouting be.

BTerran wrote: But what would lead you to choose one place over another? Is it merely a matter of more thoroughly scouting the places that are best known for their hockey talent or - in the case of the OHL for example - scouting the best teams? Like I said before, that just doesn't feel interesting to me unless there's that second variable there.

Or maybe you scout teams that have specific players that you're interested in? In my example, I decided to scout Sarnia because Brett Ritchie was a player that fit my prospect needs (I needed a RW prospect in my organization) and he was ranked around where I was expecting to pick in the draft. I also saw that they had a couple other players who would be available in the draft, all be it much later than Ritchie (the other two were ranked #53 and #175). Because I decide to watch the team closer, I get a better look at these guys who might be good later round draft picks. Sarnia is by no means a power house. I'm watching them because of interest in a player.

BTerran wrote: So now scouting is a balancing act between sending your scouts to places where you can learn more about the blue chip prospects or sending scouts to places where you're more likely to find those 3rd+ round gems.

And that balance would be a part of the strategy. It gives people options to do things differently.

empach wrote:I really like bruins72 system. It's looks great. I'd like to combine it with BTerran suggestion to have the game automatically take you to the scout screen when the scout has finished his latest assignment.

I will just make it so that you get some news in your inbox telling you that a scout has finished his assignment and is looking for new tasks. This news would also include some kind of summary of what he has found.

dabo wrote:

empach wrote:I really like bruins72 system. It's looks great. I'd like to combine it with BTerran suggestion to have the game automatically take you to the scout screen when the scout has finished his latest assignment.

I will just make it so that you get some news in your inbox telling you that a scout has finished his assignment and is looking for new tasks. This news would also include some kind of summary of what he has found.

Bringing you to the mailbox with that message highlighted in some way might help (similar to what EHM does). The only reason why I suggest that is because the mailbox can get cluttered with unessiental information and things can get lost as a result.

bruins72 wrote:Or maybe you scout teams that have specific players that you're interested in? In my example, I decided to scout Sarnia because Brett Ritchie was a player that fit my prospect needs (I needed a RW prospect in my organization) and he was ranked around where I was expecting to pick in the draft. I also saw that they had a couple other players who would be available in the draft, all be it much later than Ritchie (the other two were ranked #53 and #175). Because I decide to watch the team closer, I get a better look at these guys who might be good later round draft picks. Sarnia is by no means a power house. I'm watching them because of interest in a player.

I understand that, I just want to make sure it's more than just: I want a RW, Sarnia is a highly ranked RW, therefore I will scout Sarnia. I'm not saying that can't be an aspect of it, but I want that second element. IE- say Sarnia is ranked 15th overall by ISS and I have the 13th pick. I can choose to spend my resources scouting Sarnia or I can focus them on scouting less conventional options. But by doing so, I'd want to make sure there's some sort of potential reward associated with scouting the less conventional options and that it's an inuitive (rather than guess work) process.

Which leads into what you said next:

bruins72 wrote:And that balance would be a part of the strategy. It gives people options to do things differently.

I'd be happy if there was a system in place where you could scout the way you want to and I could seek out my diamonds in the rough. In otherwords, I could play the way I want and you the way you want, and they'd both be valid. That to me makes it strategic. I just want to present my ideal way of scouting, because it would create that additional tactic and when you have multiple valid tactics, then it does become strategic.

I just want their to be some sort of system in place that helps point you in a potentially correct direction if you want to spend your resources hunting those diamonds in the rough (ie- giving you a % odds of finding a diamond in the rough in that area). Which would help teams like Detroit which rarely has high picks, whereas teams like Edmonton would focus more on scouting the blue chips.

BTerran wrote:Bringing you to the mailbox with that message highlighted in some way might help (similar to what EHM does). The only reason why I suggest that is because the mailbox can get cluttered with unessiental information and things can get lost as a result.

Use a filter.

dabo wrote:

BTerran wrote:Bringing you to the mailbox with that message highlighted in some way might help (similar to what EHM does). The only reason why I suggest that is because the mailbox can get cluttered with unessiental information and things can get lost as a result.

Use a filter.

That helps, but it still means you have to check it on a daily basis, which slows down the flow of the game. That's fine if there's critical mail every turn, but if 9 times out of 10 you're checking your mailbox and nothing of note is there, it feels like your wasting time. Would I have the option to set my mailbox so it alerts me of certain types of mail?

BTerran wrote:Would I have the option to set my mailbox so it alerts me of certain types of mail?

I guess we could do that, not that I think it takes that long to check the inbox, I always do that when it says I got news.

dabo wrote:

BTerran wrote:Would I have the option to set my mailbox so it alerts me of certain types of mail?

I guess we could do that, not that I think it takes that long to check the inbox, I always do that when it says I got news.

Yeah, it may boil down to a personal preference rather than a norm. When I'm on a rebuilding team, I tend to play more towards certain major events (the trade deadline, entry draft, free agency period, etc) and the day-to-day stuff blurs together a bit. So I might not want to check my mail every day in December because I'm more fixated on getting to February. Similarly, I don't pay much attention to what's happening in March/April and early June if my team isn't playoff bound.

I could make it so that certain news requires immediate attention and you cannot continue to the next day until you have checked it out.

dabo wrote:I could make it so that certain news requires immediate attention and you cannot continue to the next day until you have checked it out.

That would be ideal for me.

I'd like that too.

This may be getting a bit off the topic but in regards to the mail, I wonder if that could be done differently than the way it in in EHM. Maybe have a message center set up like an email program with folders on the left side for different types of messages. You could have...

League News
Team News
Scouting
Minor Leagues
Prospects
Trade Center

Then you could have the number of unread messages next to each folder. Click on the folder and you'll be brought to the contents of that folder. This would help keep the news/mail organized and let you ignore the stuff you're not interested in. You could even have red flags on items that require attention.

bruins72 wrote:This may be getting a bit off the topic but in regards to the mail, I wonder if that could be done differently than the way it in in EHM. Maybe have a message center set up like an email program with folders on the left side for different types of messages. You could have...

League News
Team News
Scouting
Minor Leagues
Prospects
Trade Center

Then you could have the number of unread messages next to each folder. Click on the folder and you'll be brought to the contents of that folder. This would help keep the news/mail organized and let you ignore the stuff you're not interested in. You could even have red flags on items that require attention.

OOTP Baseball does something like this. It also lets you select which categories of news you'd like to receive so your inbox doesn't get cluttered with stuff you don't read anyhow.

To add one more trombone to the band...What about something like "multi-level freelance scouting" (which I'll call MLFS)?

I'll use myself as an example here. Let's say that I, located in central Ohio, were hired by an NHL team as a scout. Under the MLFS, rather than following one specific team for a period of team, it would be up to me to hit as many levels as possible. One night that could be watching Ohio State, one night that could be watching Miami or Bowling Green, one night watching Erie or Plymouth (OHL), one night Cincinnati (ECHL), one night Columbus (NHL) and so on. All are within a three-hour drive and would be reasonable for an actual scout to see.

As an aside to a slightly different topic, I wouldn't mind seeing what certain other scouts have to say. The average fan has access to any of a number of scouting agencies during the pre-draft time period, and teams themselves are certainly aware of them. Instead of having a ton of scouting reports available from your own scouts, perhaps it would be possible to have a posting on May 15 of a particular year that "The THN Draft Preview Issue has been released. Click here to see their top 100, click here to merge their rankings into the overall scouting rankings, and click here to merge their scouting notes into yours".

Then it would be possible to pull up a more comprehensive scouting report that would say something like:
Player X
(general information)
Draft rankings: CSS 4, THN 7, ISS 6
Mock drafts: THN 9th, CSS 2nd, ISS 6th
Teams looking to draft player before you can:
One-line scouting notes:
Injury concerns: