EHM The Blue Line

Hey everyone, first time posting and first time playing EHM. After getting sick of playing NHL 15 then NHL 09 and finally NHL 04 I decided I wanted something different and gave EHM:EA a shot.
I'm having a bit of trouble so I wanted to get the advice of veteran GMs/Coaches.

1. Resigning/Asst. GM Stats
I can never seem to resign players with expiring contracts for a little less to save a few bucks. It seems that I have to always sign them for what they're asking with no wiggle room. Does man management or any other personnel stat affect this or is it just really difficult to find how much less they are willing to take?

2. Trading
I've found this to be really frustrating, I can almost never get a trade to come back fair. It's almost always considered a "lopsided offer". Some trades I have managed to make were as GM for the Coyotes, Mike McKenna for Dominic Moore and Ryan Haggerty (Which to me seemed very lopsided for them but was deemed a great deal) and as GM for the Rangers, I needed to clear up 8 million in cap space so Girardi, 2018 1st, 2019, 1st, 2020 1st pick, and the rights to Halverson(? I can't remember) for Connor McDavid. The Vancouver Canucks refused to trade Girardi for Tanev and instead offered me Tanev for two picks. I've been told that the AI puts a big emphasis on young players and picks but it would seem they won't even take my picks. Somehow Phaneuf was traded to the Devils for a 3rd round pick as was Dubynk for a 3rd to some team. I've tried trading for unhappy or trade block players but to no avail.

3. Tactics
I've been using one of the uploaded tactics, I believe it was called RedWings Barrage or something along those lines. It helps win games but I also tend to give up a lot of goals and lose in OT or rarely get blown out. In the two seasons I've played on separate saves I finished with 114 pts and 131 pts. The first season had few injuries and the second had many. I've tweaked the tactics in the second season which seemed to do wonders both for my team and team USA when I managed/coached them. I'm assuming the best thing I could do here is to keep tweaking until I hit that perfect blend but I will gladly take any advice here.

4. Salary Cap
Does it ever raise or lower? I've played two seasons and it's remained at 69 million.

5. Scouting
Is there a way to keep scouts from only reporting on players a few times? I'm a bit tired of hearing that the same players are excellent prospects who are a few years from reaching their potential.

6. Line Matching
Is there any way to assign a defensive pair to shadow a single player? Or does setting "player to check" take care of that?

7. Coach Firing
The AI does it a lot, my Rangers had Vigneault as the head coach with Joel Quenneville and Patrick Roy (who seemed to do wonders for my goalies) as Assistant coaches. I suspect that the latter may have had a big impact on my team's success or maybe I just think they did.

8. GMing National Teams
I did everything myself for the national team but it looked like I could hire personnel. They were doing great with me doing everything so I left it alone. Was it possible to have hired a head coach/asst. coaches for them?

That's all I can think of for now. Thank you all for any help you can offer me! Take care!

1. Resigning/Asst. GM Stats
I can never seem to resign players with expiring contracts for a little less to save a few bucks. It seems that I have to always sign them for what they're asking with no wiggle room. Does man management or any other personnel stat affect this or is it just really difficult to find how much less they are willing to take?

Most players will ask for at least the same kind of money they were getting prior to renewal if not a raise (small raise for support players/big raise for hot prospects whose initial rookie contract as expired). Some older players on the downfall will accept a salary cut from the last contract they had, almost the only case you sign them for less. You can make an offer for less of what a player is asking if the demand seems unreasonable and I've seen guys resign for much less of what they were requesting but this is not a common thing.

2. Trading
I've found this to be really frustrating, I can almost never get a trade to come back fair. It's almost always considered a "lopsided offer". Some trades I have managed to make were as GM for the Coyotes, Mike McKenna for Dominic Moore and Ryan Haggerty (Which to me seemed very lopsided for them but was deemed a great deal) and as GM for the Rangers, I needed to clear up 8 million in cap space so Girardi, 2018 1st, 2019, 1st, 2020 1st pick, and the rights to Halverson(? I can't remember) for Connor McDavid. The Vancouver Canucks refused to trade Girardi for Tanev and instead offered me Tanev for two picks. I've been told that the AI puts a big emphasis on young players and picks but it would seem they won't even take my picks. Somehow Phaneuf was traded to the Devils for a 3rd round pick as was Dubynk for a 3rd to some team. I've tried trading for unhappy or trade block players but to no avail.

You should be able to make plenty of trades that would actually be unfair for the AI and benefit you a lot. The game is actually trying to make trades harder and more realistic with each updates as of now. Sometimes trading a player requires you to look at many team to see what you can achieve and you usually can get a team that gives you more than what they get. However some players are extremely difficult if not impossible to acquire, those are usually the young and already established players that are future franchise players. You also have players of your own that are worth nothing. AI doesn't like big contracts also. Maybe with experience you will get better at getting good trades for yourself.

3. Tactics
I've been using one of the uploaded tactics, I believe it was called RedWings Barrage or something along those lines. It helps win games but I also tend to give up a lot of goals and lose in OT or rarely get blown out. In the two seasons I've played on separate saves I finished with 114 pts and 131 pts. The first season had few injuries and the second had many. I've tweaked the tactics in the second season which seemed to do wonders both for my team and team USA when I managed/coached them. I'm assuming the best thing I could do here is to keep tweaking until I hit that perfect blend but I will gladly take any advice here.

I am not a big fan of tactics myself. I find that your rosters will make for most of your team success or not. It also depends if you are using the quick sim engine or the full simulation engine. The latest will have a bigger interaction with your tactics. There are no single formula when it comes to tactics. It depends on the type of players and the mix of those on each lines as well as your coaches play styles.

4. Salary Cap
Does it ever raise or lower? I've played two seasons and it's remained at 69 million.

No and it won't ever change. Maybe a game editor will be made for the game later on that will allow you to modify its value. There are no inflation in the game either so no need for it to change although UFA's in general will sign for bigger sums of money that what a similar player is earning so eventually you get bigger salaries for those former UFA's but it should reset with the wave of next gen players.

5. Scouting
Is there a way to keep scouts from only reporting on players a few times? I'm a bit tired of hearing that the same players are excellent prospects who are a few years from reaching their potential.

With the latest updates on the game, by default, you shouldn't even receive detailed information in your mailbox for each player the scout recommends. This can be changed again to something else when you click assign scout and select what to scout. Before you confirm the scouting selection there is a window where you can modify the time spent scouting that selection, quality of players looked at and retained and the type of updates, etc.

6. Line Matching
Is there any way to assign a defensive pair to shadow a single player? Or does setting "player to check" take care of that?

You got it right, you can assign you defensive tactics to play zonal or man to man. To check a specific player you have to set player to check in the personal tactics.

7. Coach Firing
The AI does it a lot, my Rangers had Vigneault as the head coach with Joel Quenneville and Patrick Roy (who seemed to do wonders for my goalies) as Assistant coaches. I suspect that the latter may have had a big impact on my team's success or maybe I just think they did.

Yes AI have very little patience and fires too many coaches. One of the updates so far claimed that coach firing would be tweaked but I am not sure if it actually makes a difference.

8. GMing National Teams
I did everything myself for the national team but it looked like I could hire personnel. They were doing great with me doing everything so I left it alone. Was it possible to have hired a head coach/asst. coaches for them?

Noy sure about this one. I have managed National team in the previous versions of this game but don't really enjoy doing it so I can't remember. I would think that you can't decide the staff positions for them but maybe I am wrong.

All great answers above.

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