I am new to this game.  How do you know what to set your player distribution settings on . How does it work

Simple answer - you assign numbers to player based upon the ratio of distro that you want them to get in comparison to other players.  Supposedly, the game will take the 5 players on the court and total their distro and create a percentage that a play is run for/thru them. So, it doesn't matter if you assign all 100 points as the game is only creating a ratio from the 5 on the court.  

So, say you have 20, 10, 5, 5, 0 on the court.  That will translate to 50%, 25%, 12.5%, 12.5% & 0.  Of course, the player with 0 might get  a put-back or something, but the plays won't be run to them.   If you ended up with 20, 2, 1, 1, 1, then that would be 80%, 8%, & 3 @ 4%.   

You can, and I suggest that you do, give everyone a 0 distro for the first exhibition game and see what the sim chooses to do.  The sim will assign distro based on its own process (maybe good, maybe not).  However, do go though and assign +/-.  I suggest a rule of thumb of 90+ PER +2; 70+ PER; +1; 60+ PER 0; 50+ PER -1 and everything below 50 -2.  Save to all defenses.  After that first exhibition, set your distributions with the best guess from what you learned and save to all defenses again.  Adjust from there.

You use the player distribution tool as a percentage. For example, if Player A was at 12, Player B was at 6 and Player C was at 3 and everyone else was set to "0" that would be a total of 24. On average and for all intensive purposes, if A, B and C were in at the same time, Player A would take half the shots since he was 12 out of a total 24.

However, if you have Player B and Player C on the second line and they were never in the game at the same time as Player A, then Player A take all of the shots. On the second line, it would take Player B at 6 and Player B at 3, then Player B would end up with 2/3rd of the total shots and Player C would end up with 1/3rd of the total shots.

If you're new to the game or have trouble with math concepts, it's better to just set the total at 100 and the percentages are much easier to figure out. Then, using the example above, Player A would be at 50, Player B would be at 25 and Player C would be at 12.5(12 or 13).

On another added note, it is not uncommon for the Sim to go away from the settings. For instance, if Player A has a really good defender on him in a man to man defense and with a high offensive IQ, the Sim may give more shots to another player. Also, if a player gets an offensive rebound and he has an easy layup off of that, he's not going to give the ball back to the PG, which may have the highest disto.

and keep in mind, the distro isn't literally the number of shots a guy will take - it is something like the share of plays run for him - a play can lead to a shot, but not always - other outcomes are possible

I don't assign 100 percent, but that can be fine especially for beginners.  I tend to give out distro that totals in the 70-80 range.  That makes it easy for me to increase or decrease a players distro for a particular game without adjusting others. 

take a simple - NOT suggested example - if my starters have distro of 10-10-10-5-5 and my subs have distros ranging from a high of 10 - for a guy who has great offensive skills but cant defend well enough to start - to a low of 1.  Now lets say that all adds up to 75.  Now, I face an opponent that leads me to want to goose up one player's distro or the distro for my guards.  I can do that and my total is say 85 or 88

one other note - I have heard various theories on what a distro of zero causes.  I tend to go with 1 as my minimum cause I don't know whether zero leads to some sort of default level of distro or what.  Also, I take pity on these guys and want to get them into the box score.......for the sake of their family and friends.

Zero leads to zero if any other players on the floor has anything other than zero. If everyone on the floor has zero the computer will handle it like it handles it sims.

The old Admin stated in a prior developer chat that he didn't recommend adjusting the settings to "0"  The reason being is it will select the best player to shoot and won't take any other factors into consideration, such as the player that's defending him or the type of defense that's being used.

Posted by a_in_the_b on 12/30/2014 11:30:00 AM (view original):
Zero leads to zero if any other players on the floor has anything other than zero. If everyone on the floor has zero the computer will handle it like it handles it sims.

but how does that make the kid feel?

Posted by metsmax on 12/30/2014 11:54:00 AM (view original):

Posted by a_in_the_b on 12/30/2014 11:30:00 AM (view original):
Zero leads to zero if any other players on the floor has anything other than zero. If everyone on the floor has zero the computer will handle it like it handles it sims.

but how does that make the kid feel?

Both of these comments are precisely the reason I only suggest doing it during the exhibition games.  Probably only the first exhibition.  Once the regular season starts, you want to have the distros set to something. 

Whats the highest number of distro you all set on one player? Ive heard some dont go higher than 10. Also, why do certain starters who have lower distro take so many more shots in comparison to others?

distro is a complicated thing.

As noted above, it is a ratio among the guys on the floor.  So you can see a guy get lots of shots if he spends lots of minutes on the floor with other guys with low distro

Also, shots dont all come off distro.  For example, offensive rebounds are - I believe - outside that scheme.  I think there are other ways to get shots outside of distro.

Posted by fd343ny on 12/30/2014 1:29:00 PM (view original):
distro is a complicated thing.

As noted above, it is a ratio among the guys on the floor.  So you can see a guy get lots of shots if he spends lots of minutes on the floor with other guys with low distro

Also, shots dont all come off distro.  For example, offensive rebounds are - I believe - outside that scheme.  I think there are other ways to get shots outside of distro.

I agree, offensive put-backs are totally outside the realm of distribution settings. From what I can discern, fastbreak buckets that result from steals by defenders or intercepted/bad passes that lead to immediate layups at the opposite end are also not taken out of distro. End of half/game half court and full court 3-point prayers are completely random and also do not seem to be the product of a distribution setting. 

Posted by kevodaphenom on 12/30/2014 12:51:00 PM (view original):
Whats the highest number of distro you all set on one player? Ive heard some dont go higher than 10. Also, why do certain starters who have lower distro take so many more shots in comparison to others?

The old Admin said that anything above 20 will bring diminishing returns. I don't know if that still holds or not. I generally don't go above 15 (on a 100 point scale).

I believe that players have "personalities" that lead some to be ball hogs that take extra shots and others who you practically have to beg to take a shot. I don't have any proof of this but that's the best explanation I can come up with.

there was once speculation that high school stats gave some indication of such a personality trend - but I am not aware of any confirmation - with data or from Admin......